Someone To Understand
by Sallywags
Summary: Sirius Black was Hogwarts resident womaniser, but what will he do when he finds a girl who can resist him and, who has the potential to understand him even when James doesn't, what will happen when she has the same dark past as him? Real Chapter 13 up now
1. Default Chapter

**Someone To Understand**

**Disclaimer: Sadly I own nothing except any OCs, so please don't sue!**

**BANG!**

An explosion rocked the great hall, as four Gryffindors students let out a great whoop of laughter. Unsurprisingly it had come from the far side of the great hall, the Slytherin table to be more precise, and had seemed to cause all the occupants of the table to spontaneously grow feathers before quickly malting and returning to normal. After a moment of stunned silence the entire hall burst out laughing, apart from one girl, Crystal Maycomb at the Ravenclaw table knew better.

Her ocean blue eyes glittering with anger, she was inwardly seething. The prank had been amusing, that she would admit but the consequences of it were sure to be unpleasant. Her older brother Marius, older sister Violet and younger sister Abigail were in Slytherin and therefore some of the victims of the prank, and her brother at least was sure to blame her for it. Merlin she hated the Marauders!

Glaring at the Marauders she thought bitterly about the confrontation with Marius and her sisters, which was now sure to happen later today. She had been hoping to put off her next family argument for at least a few days after the traditional, before the train journey, 'You brought shame on the family name by allowing yourself to be sorted into Ravenclaw with the mudbloods and blood traitors' speech from her parents.

She sighed bitterly. Nothing ever seemed to go her way, she had known since she was a child that her ideals were different from her parent's, she didn't believe in the purity of wizard's blood like her parents did, though she had too much sense to actually say it to them.

She had been influenced greatly by her late grandmother, Desralda McKenna, a powerful witch and a good woman who had been forced by her aristocratic pure blood family to marry Crystal's tyrannical late grandfather Julianus Maycomb. Desralda had toed the line of social propriety whilst Julianus was alive, rightly fearing his wrath for any digressions, but she too did not hold with any of the traditional pureblood ideas. When her husband was gone she wasted no time in imparting her wisdom to the most open minded of their grandchildren, Crystal.

Crystal's grandmother was the only member of her family who Crystal actually trusted and loosing her at age nine had been a huge blow, she would now have to hold out against the prejudice of her family alone. She now, unfortunately, knew how trapped and isolated Desralda must have felt all those years ago.

Crystal's only hope was to keep a low profile. She was after all the middle daughter of her family, not even a boy, she could easily slip under their radar, pass through school quietly and then, as soon as she came of age leave to do what she wanted for once. She thought it would be simple. She was wrong.

It had all started when the stupid sorting hat had decided to put her in Ravenclaw, effectively highlighting, to her entire psychotic family, the fact that she was different, the only Maycomb to EVER not be sorted into Slytherin. She had pleaded with the hat to reconsider, longing for the anonymity that being put in Slytherin would provide her with, and cringing with terror when it began to suggest that she be sorted into Gryffindor. She might have wanted to stand up to her family but she didn't have a death wish, and being sorted into Gryffindor would have been like showing a red flag to a bull, she wouldn't have survived, it was as simple as that. Eventually she had acquiesced to the hat's suggestion to put her in Ravenclaw, it was after all, better to be put in Ravenclaw than Gryffindor. But, ever since, her family had seen her as the 'bad egg' of the family and determined to change her into something more fitting to what they thought she should be. Lately they had even been pressuring her to join their little crusade to rid the world of muggle borns and assert their rights as pure bloods, she was disgusted with the idea but couldn't say as much.

To her family Crystal was just another pawn to be played to their advantage, and she had betrayed them by simply being whom she was. Marius, particularly, was never going to let her forget that, and would use any excuse to torture her, often literally. No, she was not looking forward to running into him later. He was going to be in a foul mood after the public humiliation, and she, not the Marauders, would be the one to pay for it. Not that she would ever let anyone know what was happening, still, she could blame the Marauders…

"Brilliant wasn't it," enthused her best friend Sienna Morgan arriving energetically at the Ravenclaw table, five minutes late as usual and completely misunderstanding the intense, slightly glazed look that Crystal was shooting at the Marauders, "those Marauders get funnier every year, not to mention fitter, Merlin Sirius is soo hot!" She gushed excitedly, caramel eyes twinkling as she flicked her shoulder length auburn hair over her shoulders and stared flirtatiously over at Sirius.

"If you're going to spend all breakfast drooling over Sirius I'll go now and spend some time in the library before class…" Crystal began irritated with the way this first breakfast of the year was starting. They had been back at Hogwarts for less that twenty four hours and Sienna was already talking about Sirius! She had dearly missed her friend over the summer, not really being able to see her, because her parents viewed Sienna's family as being 'muggle lovers'. She had had to rely solely on letters for communication but she was not about to listen to another one of Sienna's rambles about how wonderful Sirius Black was, not after what he had just cost her…

"No!" Sienna interrupted violently, "You spend enough time in the library as it is, you are not going to turn into even more of a bookworm than you already are, not if I have anything to do with it!"

Seemingly satisfied with her little rant Sienna promptly sat down and began to help herself to breakfast, still unconsciously eying Sirius, who was now sitting over at the Gryffindor table with the other Marauders.

Crystal smiled inwardly and continued to read the large tome she had been poring over before the Marauders notorious start of term prank. She was secretly pleased with her friend's violent reaction to her suggestion, glad for once that someone cared about what she was doing. She was not by nature a bookworm, but experience had taught her to always be prepared. The best way to do this was to read, to know more than her enemy did, to outsmart them, which often proved difficult when dealing with cunning Slytherins. She sighed quietly this year was not going to be easy…

XXXX

Oblivious to the stares being directed their way from the Ravenclaw table, not to mention the many other gazes fixed on them from around the hall, the four 6th year boys known as the Marauders were discussing the success of their latest start of term prank.

"You know I think we should have pulled something during Dumbledore's start of term speech, can you imagine the looks on the teacher's faces if we had…." Began Sirius Black, the Marauder known more commonly to his friends as Padfoot, as he casually brushed his elegant black hair out of his stormy grey eyes whilst his smaller watery eyed companion, Peter Pettigrew, more commonly known to the Marauders as Wormtail, nodded in fervent agreement.

"We've been through this before guys," Remus Lupin, the Marauder more commonly known as Moony patiently explained, shooting an exasperated look at his messy black haired companion James Potter, more commonly known to the Marauders as Prongs, (who was presently not listening to a word his friends were saying, but was instead watching intently a girl from their year with dark red hair and shocking emerald green eyes), "we don't have time to set anything up between arriving at the school and the welcome speech it just wouldn't work." He explained wearily raking a hand through his long sandy brown hair.

"I know." Interrupted Sirius seemingly irritated by his inability to find a brilliant way round this particular problem, a sullen look passing across his devilishly handsome aristocratic features before quickly switching to a charming roguish smile, as he finished excitedly, "But just imagine if we could." At the thought he sighed in anticipation, "We'd go down in Hogwarts history for sure, right Prongs?" He said excitedly jabbing James in the ribs.

XXX

James had been sitting in silent contemplation of Lily Evans, the spectacular red head who seemed, through no fault of his own, to hate his guts when he was suddenly jarred out of reverie by a sharp jab in the ribs courtesy of his so called friend Sirius Black, the resident "heart throb" of Hogwarts.

"James," began his best friend angrily, it was never a good sign when Sirius called him James, "Have you been listening to a word I said or have you just been staring at Evans for the last ten minutes?" He questioned angrily, "If you like her so much just ask her out already, she's just another girl, and its not like you haven't dated before, Merlin half the school wants to get into your pants so just ask her out already!" Finished Sirius dramatically throwing his arms into the air for emphasis.

"Yeah!" Piped up Wormtail squeakily, "You can get any girl in school, just ask her out!"

Just as James was starting to get convinced, (and rightly so!) of his school stud status, Remus Lupin, Moony the prefect, friend to Lily Evans and most mature of the Marauders logically stated that James had been trying, unsuccessfully to ask her out since the middle of 5th year, and after months of rejections he was still no closer to winning her than he had been at the start. After all, she was convinced that he was an arrogant prick and told him as much whenever she got the chance, with this simple, but true, statement James' bubble burst, he was never going to get Lily!

"Oh cheer up Prongs!" Sirius comforted cheerfully, "Evans'll realise what a stud you are eventually and until then I think a demonstration is in order, to help you brush up on the basics." Started Sirius pompously, "And who better to demonstrate the fine art of wooing a fair maiden than me, Sirius Alexander Black?"

"Knock it off Padfoot." Began Moony testily, smacking Sirius upside the head, "Prongs does not need your kind of 'help' to get Evans, he needs to prove to her that he's changed…" Explained Remus.

"But he hasn't," interrupted Peter, "he's still the same old Prongs!" He finished proudly patting James on the back.

"That's exactly the problem!" Huffed Remus inaudibly, slumping into his chair, whilst the other three continued to argue about what James should do about Evans.

Finally after about three minutes of more 'suggestions' for James from Peter and Sirius about Evans Sirius took control of the conversation again. "I'm going to show you how its done James," stated Sirius confidently, "all I need is to find a girl…"

"One you haven't already been out with," scoffed Remus rejoining the conversation. Sirius scowled, after all Remus had a point, after five years in Hogwarts he had gone through a large section of the female population. There weren't a lot of girls that he hadn't gone out with, this of course did not include Slytherins (He did have some standards!), or those that he and the other Marauders arrogantly deemed 'not pretty enough' to bother with. Irritated and determined to prove Moony wrong he frantically began to scan the Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw tables for girls in the right age bracket, not even bothering to glance at the Gryffindor table knowing full well that he had already slept with half the girls in the appropriate years there.

XXXX

It was at this point that Crystal stopped reading and turned to look at Sienna again. She had stopped eating and was again staring longingly at the Gryffindor table, or more precisely Sirius Black, who, Crystal couldn't help but notice seemed to be in the middle of a heated debate with Remus Lupin...

Remus Lupin was the only one of the Marauders Crystal could stomach. He was quieter than his friends, sweeter and more mature, hence being made a prefect. She had only talked to him once or twice, being in the year bellow and not a prefect but he had always been polite to her and considerate of her feelings, something she wasn't used to at home. She strongly preferred him to that arrogant berk James Potter, that stupid runt Peter Pettigrew or that seductive bastard Sirius Black.

During her time at Hogwarts Crystal had seen Sirius use and then dump dozens of girls. It amazed her that anyone would actually willingly go out with such a player, everyone knew his reputation, was it just that they were naive enough to believe that, with them he 'really cared' and wouldn't dare to use them? Why an intelligent girl like Sienna would ever want to go out with him she would never know, she was a Ravenclaw for Merlin's sake, not some stupid little Hufflepuff!

Crystal herself would never consider going out with Sirius. He was an arrogant show off only out for one thing, and truthfully she didn't date, it wasn't worth the drama of what her family would do to her if she went out with someone they didn't approve of. It wasn't that she didn't get offers for dates, she did, with her striking ocean blue eyes, long curly ebony hair, porcelain skin and refined aristocratic features she was strikingly beautiful, if, because of her determination to lay low, a little shy.

Suddenly hearing a lull in conversation from the Gryffindor side of the Great Hall Crystal looked at Sirius again, only to see him grinning cockily at something. She turned her head to question Sienna and was shocked to find her blushing and gazing back at Sirius, a smile stupidly crossing her pretty face…


	2. Asking Out Sienna

**Someone To Understand**

**Disclaimer: Sadly I own nothing except any OCs, so please don't sue!**

"Bingo!" Exclaimed Sirius excitedly; he had finally spotted a pretty girl that he hadn't yet been out with at the Ravenclaw table. She was petite and slim with shoulder length auburn hair, caramel coloured eyes and a pretty face, and better still she was looking over at the Gryffindor table watching him with a dazed expression, so she was definitely interested. "Its almost too easy," he thought giving the girl a lopsided cocky grin which made her blush horribly as well as causing a goofy smile to spread across her face.

It was at this point that Prongs seemed to notice what had captured his friend's attention and smiled, laughing at the girl's extreme reaction to Sirius' charms.

"Your well in there mate!" He laughed good naturedly whilst Peter began gushing about how pretty she was and how good she would look on Sirius' arm.

Remus meanwhile rolled his eyes at his friends' childish behaviour before saying seriously, "Just don't break her heart Sirius," at this point he fixed his friend with a penetrating stare and continued, "Sienna Morgan is a nice girl, she doesn't deserve to get hurt."

"Oh come on Moony lighten up!" Sirius demanded, "She's just another girl..." he began before noticing the dark expression on Remus' face, "and anyway," he quickly covered, "its not like I'm setting out to hurt her, we'll just have a little fun…" He finished lamely, realising that he wasn't going to be able to get himself out of the hole he had made if he kept digging. He sighed realising that this close to the full moon, pissing off a werewolf, like Remus, was probably not a good idea. If Remus had decided, for whatever reason to protect this girl from him perhaps he should just accept it and exercise a little more caution than usual around her, after all he was really only trying to show James how easy it was to ask a girl out.

Now that that was sorted in his mind he would now have to figure out how exactly he was going to ask her out…

XXX

Crystal couldn't believe it, how could Sienna, a smart girl, be grinning stupidly and blushing because of that arrogant prat Sirius Black? Was she really taken in by that stupid cocky smile of his?

In irritation at Sienna's still glazed expression Crystal snapped her fingers in front of her eyes, hoping to bring her out of it. Fortunately she snapped out of it quickly, but then realising what she had just done she blushed again and, to Crystal's dismay, promptly began babbling incoherently about how Sirius had smiled at her, and it was a 'sign' that he was interested in her.

Crystal couldn't believe her ears, what exactly was Sienna thinking to be getting this worked up about Sirius Black? Sure Sirius was gorgeous and cool and popular, but he was still just another guy to Crystal and not even a particularly nice one, he was far too vain and arrogant for a start.

So surprised was Crystal by this turn of events that she didn't even notice as Sirius Black himself, approached the Ravenclaw table from behind…

XXX

Sirius had decided that the best course of action for asking out Sienna was to catch her while she was still flustered so that he could startle her into saying 'yes'. So, explaining his theory to his fellow Marauders, he casually grabbed his school bag from under the table and began to stride purposely towards the Ravenclaw table.

Reaching the table in seconds Sirius gave Sienna his most debonair smile and began flirtatiously with the line "I noticed you from across the room and I just had to come over and introduce myself." Before continuing with "Your name's Sienna, right?" Hoping to flatter her with his intimate knowledge of her.

It worked but perhaps a little too well as Sienna was now so flustered that all she could manage was a feeble "Yes." Before blushing scarlet, and refusing to meet his eye.

Deciding to carry on with his mission regardless Sirius continued with a short and very sweet offer of a date, more specifically a "Marauder tour of the castle" that evening, whilst hoping against hope that Sienna would pull herself together enough to answer. He was not disappointed and after a few seconds of stunned silence at her good luck Sienna happily agreed to the date.

Sirius was delighted, he had proved his point! James had seen the whole exchange, and would hopefully 'learn' from it, and he now had a pretty new girlfriend to hang around with, until he became bored of her at least. He stood grinning cockily at Sienna for a minute before some movement to her side caught his eye…

The movement turned out to be a girl, and not just any girl; she was the most strikingly beautiful girl he had ever seen in his whole life. She had fiery blue eyes, long curly, luxurious ebony hair, porcelain skin and refined aristocratic features. She was absolutely stunning, so how was it that he had not seen her from across the hall?

The answer to this riddle quickly became apparent to Sirius as the girl shifted in her arms a huge, not to mention ancient looking tome, which would effectively block her face from view from where he had been sitting at the Gryffindor table. He couldn't help but stare at her, but to his shock and horror when she noticed his attention she merely rolled her eyes and turned back to her book. Shocked at the unknown girl's lack of interest in him Sirius recovered himself enough to give Sienna a last winning smile before deciding to head off to Defence Against the Dark Arts early, it would give him time to ponder the girl's reaction.

XXX

Over at the Gryffindor table the Marauders were not the only ones watching Sirius' display with interest. A group of 6th year girls were also watching Sienna's reaction to Sirius' advances with amusement.

"Its disgusting how these girls just drool all over him." Exclaimed Lily Evans with distaste, "No wonder he thinks that he's God's gift when they react like that to him!" She said waving her hand dramatically in the direction of the Ravenclaw table and the, even now, flushing Sienna.

"I know what you mean." Concurred Maya Goldberg, a pretty blond and former conquest of Sirius' "You'd think that they'd learn but they never do."

"Yeah I know." Returned Rose Parker in exasperation, "How can they expect him to respect them when they act like that?" She questioned absolutely incredulous at Sienna's behaviour. She herself had been trying to get Sirius's attention for years, as her friends well knew, though until recently he would not have deemed her pretty enough to bother with as she had been a little overweight, and she knew for a fact that she would never act like that around him. Why would she? If she did he would simply see her as another nameless, faceless, conquest.

Rose was therefore being very careful about how she went about getting Sirius's attention herself. She wanted him to respect her and not just see her as a piece of meat, and that meant becoming his friend first or, to make it less obvious, getting the two groups to become friends. It had taken a lot to convince Lily to become friends with the Marauders, more specifically James, but with Remus' help she felt certain that this year her plan would work and she and Sirius could finally get together. However little Ravenclaw tarts were certainly not in her plan.

She sighed and returned reluctantly from her reverie to the conversation. Lily was yet again bitching about James whilst Louise Wilkes, the group's very own annoying tag along nodded in agreement. It was going to be a long day…

XXX

"I can't believe he asked me out!" Screeched Sienna excitedly, for the fifth time in as many minutes.

"I would never have guessed!" Returned Crystal sarcastically, "Now can we get back to brewing this potion or are you going to be off in lala land all lesson!" She finished wearily, knowing full well that in about two minutes Sienna would be back to staring into space and making random Sirius related exclamations whatever she said to try and snap her out of it, she doubted that even Professor Slughorn Viero, the evil tubby potions Master, would successfully be able to capture Sienna's attention for long in this mood, she could only hope that her friend would snap out of it soon.

Unfortunately Sienna was brought down to earth rather harshly at break by Mandy Corner and Patricia Boot their two fellow Ravenclaw 5th years, who they were unfortunate enough to share a dormitory with. Crystal personally couldn't stand the giggly little twits but normally Sienna was on good terms with them, even joining in with their boy-centric conversations from time to time, whilst Crystal looked on with amusement.

The two girls upon hearing that Sirius had asked out Sienna, after using and then dumping them last year taunted her about how he was really only interested in getting back with one of them. Normally Sienna would have simply told them to go to hell but today, for some reason, they were really getting to her and Crystal was forced to step in and tell them to "Get a life". An unusual occurrence, as although Crystal was fiercely loyal, she tried very hard to keep a low profile, and that meant not shouting at people, though she did make exceptions sometimes.

Aside from their bitchy roommates the rest of the day went fairly smoothly for Crystal and Sienna, though Sienna became more and more nervous as the time of her date with Sirius approached. Meanwhile Crystal grew more and more nervous about the inevitable confrontation with her brother Marius about the Marauders' morning prank…

XXX

Sirius meanwhile was still puzzled about the other girl who had been immune to his charms. He, Sirius Alexander Black, had been staring at her and she had rolled her eyes in response, like she wasn't interested in him, but he knew that all girls were interested in him, so what was wrong with this one, and why didn't he know the name of such a beautiful girl?

He couldn't understand the girl's reaction, girls did not reject him, he rejected them! It was one of the few things in his life that he actually had control over, one of the few things that his horrible pure blood family could not stop him from doing, it was not about to change because of one irritating girl!

He spent all day thinking about it, earning himself some strange looks from teachers and the other Marauders for his unusual quietness. Coming to no useful conclusions Sirius decided, in History of Magic, the last lesson of the day, to just let it go, it was obviously just a mistake. He had a date to get ready for, and no time to ponder mystery girls, though he would rather like to find out her name…

XXX

James, irritated with his best friend's lack of attention all day finally snapped at dinner when he confronted Sirius with the angry words, "What the hell has been up with you all day!" Before continuing on with his rant, and giving Sirius a disgusted look, "It has been like going to lessons with a frigging zombie, even the teachers noticed something was up…" for a second it sounded as though James would continue in this vein for some time but then it was as if a light bulb had been turned on in his head, and he exclaimed incredulously, "Don't tell me that the great Sirius Black is actually getting strung out because of a girl!" Before bursting out laughing, and earning himself a smack upside the head from Sirius.

XXX

Sirius was awoken from his musings at dinner by James' angry exclamation, and when he had told him he was nervous because of a girl he could not prevent himself from hitting James upside the head in irritation. He, Sirius Black, did not get 'strung out' about girls, they got 'strung out' about him, he simply could not believe what James was suggesting.

Getting angry with his annoying friend Sirius irritatedly exclaimed, "Yeah right Prongs!" His voice positively dripping with sarcasm, "Like I would be worried about a date, she's just another girl," before finishing arrogantly with, "besides she already likes me so I'm well in there, I've got nothing to worry about!"

It was Moony who was the first to challenge him, logically asking him, why, if he hadn't been thinking about Sienna, did he spend half of the day staring into space?

Knowing that he had been trapped by his clever friend, Sirius flushed and raked a hand through his elegant black hair, brushing it out of his eyes, realising, belatedly, what an idiot he must have looked like, spacing out all day. He decided that honesty was probably the best policy, feeling sure that his friends would laugh at him, but even more certain, that, if he didn't tell them they would probably just find out anyway and make things more difficult for him.

Steeling his resolve Sirius answered his friend honestly, whilst preparing for his other friends' sniggers, and explained carefully about the girl he had seen at the Ravenclaw table, how beautiful she was and how he could not understand why she wasn't interested in him. To his dismay, not only did James and Peter start laughing, but so did Remus as well!


	3. Crystal's Secret

Someone To Understand

Disclaimer: In case you didn't know, I own nothing but the plot and OCs.

Irritated by his friends' violent reactions Sirius patiently waited for them to regain a hold on themselves before asking, "What the bloody hell was that all about?". To his shock this only seemed to make them laugh harder until finally, after several minutes of hysterical laughter, on the parts of James Peter and Remus, James finally answered him. "I can't believe that you are arrogant enough to think that every girl in the school is looking to nail you!", James laughed excitedly, "Even I'm not that arrogant!", he finished sniggering.

"Well you're also not that good looking, unlike me...", exclaimed Sirius, indignant at his best friend's reaction and spoiling for a fight.

Remus, seemingly sensing an argument quickly stepped in, "Calm down Padfoot", he urged, "James was only kidding, you know that..."

"Yeah,", interrupted Peter, "you guys shouldn't be fighting about some dumb girl!" he told exclaimed sensibly.

"He's right," interrupted James, "Sorry", he mumbled quietly to Sirius.

"Yeah I know," muttered Sirius, seemingly satisfied that his friend was no longer laughing at him, sometimes James just didn't understand, he paused for a second and then continued cautiously, so as not to arouse suspicion, "I just wish I knew who she was..."

"What, so you can work on her?", questioned James laughing, completely missing Sirius' cautious manner.

"No," answered Sirius truthfully, "I was just curious..." he trailed off, as though it were a comment of no importance.

XXX

Remus meanwhile had raised an eyebrow at Sirius, caught by his friend's curious manner, he was not fooled by Sirius' act. "Well where is she?", he questioned thoughtfully, hoping to catch a glimpse of this mystery girl, who had Sirius so worked up.

"Over there," answered Sirius nonchalantly pointing vaguely at the Ravenclaw table, "Next to Sienna with a book."

Remus obediently looked over to the spot Sirius had mentioned and was shocked to find himself staring at Crystal Maycomb, a Ravenclaw 5th year, and Sienna's best friend. Head buried into a book she was clearly oblivious to the attention she was receiving.

Remus was positively stunned, sure Crystal was quite possibly the most gorgeous girl in school but she was quiet and bookish, not exactly Sirius's type, she never spoke to anyone unless she absolutely had to.

Sirius, noticing his shocked gaze quietly asked Remus if he knew who she was, ignoring James and Peter's intense conversation about Sirius falling for a 'bookworm'.

Not wanting to disappoint his friend, Remus quickly answered that yes, he knew her, and that she was in fact Sienna's best friend, whom he met often in the library. He paused before daring to say her name, realising that as a pure blood, and almost a Slytherin Sirius was likely to cut all ties with Crystal, that or make her life hell, as he did to Snape, simply to spite his family, so taking a deep breath to steady his nerves he answered Sirius' question, "Her name," he said dramatically, "is Crystal Maycomb."

XXX

That night Sienna dragged Crystal out of dinner after barely five minutes to 'help' her change for her date with Sirius. Normally Crystal would not have tolerated such treatment from Sienna but, seeing Sienna's nervous face had been all it took to convince her to go along with her, if only to help her try to calm down.

Herself, Crystal could not see why Sienna would possibly be so nervous about a silly date, and having never dated herself she could offer little practical advice to her so, she simply satisfied herself by helping Sienna to pick out, the perfect outfit.

It took them almost two hours but finally Sienna was ready for her date, her hair was fixed, her makeup was done and she looked stunning. From Crystal's point of view it was too much trouble to go to for simply seeing Sirius bloody Black, but as long a Sienna was happy she would keep her mouth shut, she only prayed that Sirius would not break her sweet friend's heart, Sienna could, after all, be terribly naive at times.

Sighing with concern Crystal watched Sienna leave the Ravenclaw Common Room at ten minutes to seven, her date with Sirius was at seven, and Sienna was determined not to arrive late. Crystal had decided earlier in the day that if Sienna was going to be out all evening then Crystal herself should take advantage of her absence and go to the library to get some work done, so, barely five minutes after Sienna left, Crystal herself, left the Common Room...

XXX

Still surprised at the way that Remus had reacted to the girl, Crystal, Sirius strode out Gryffindor Tower at seven to meet Sienna in the Entrance Hall. He couldn't understand why his friend had reacted like that to her name, he didn't know what to think, the name sounded familiar, but he couldn't remember from where. Shrugging off his suspicions Sirius arrived to see Sienna already waiting for him by the door, clad in some tight fitting, low slung bell bottom jeans and a figure hugging green tee shirt with her shoulder length auburn hair loose around her shoulders, she looked lovely.

He smiled cockily at her, and offering his arm seductively he took her off down the corridor. Tonight was going to be a great night!

XXX

Arriving in the Library at seven at night, Crystal had hoped to find it empty, however unfortunately fate was not on her side, and after barely five minutes of silent working, her thoughts were interrupted by a voice that made her blood run cold...

"All alone little sister?" hissed her older brother Marius nastily.

"So it would appear." agreed Crystal coldly not daring to look up from her work quite yet, she had been fearing a confrontation with Marius since the Marauders start of term prank this morning, but she still silently prayed that he would get bored and leave. It was not to be...

"What's the matter Crystal?" questioned a far too sympathetic masculine voice, very similar to one she had heard earlier... "Has your blood traitor friend gone and ditched you for my treacherous brother?" Regulus Black finished, sneering nastily. He was a Slytherin in her year and brother to Sirius Black, but he was also another pure blood fanatic, and good friends with her older brother Marius and her sisters Violet and Abigail. This was definitely not good.

Crystal remained silent, she didn't rust herself to answer his comment without angering the group surrounding her further,( she knew it was a group without even looking, because where Regulus and Marius were, Abigail, Violet, Severus Snape and Lucilla Parkinson were sure to be.), she was a good dueller and one person she could handle, but when the odds were six to one, it was better to keep her head down. Besides, even if she did win she would be sure to pay for it later, so she kept her gaze instead, unblinkingly on her homework.

"What's the matter Crys, cat got your tongue?", spat Abgail testily, she was clearly still angry from the prank this morning and out for revenge against Crystal. However it was her presence that hurt Crystal the most, the twins, Marius and Violet had always hated her but her younger sister Abbie had always been much sweeter than them, at one time she and Crystal had even been quite close, but now they would never be anything but enemies, and it hurt her more than she would ever let anyone know that this was the case.

Realising that they weren't going to leave without doing something, Crystal decided to bite the bullet, and looked up bravely. She saw exactly what she had expected to see, Severus Snape, Regulus Black and Marius were grouped together sneering at her and looking threatening, whilst the girls Violet, Abigail and Lucilla Parkinson were conversing in hushed whispers, "Probably about what they're were going to do to me." Crystal thought darkly.

As though a signal had been sounded Marius approached her again whilst Violet hurriedly scampered off, probably to check that the librarian, Madam Pince, didn't see what was happening.

Marius began, as usual, by saying how Crystal had once again brought shame on her family, and that if she would only act more appropriately and join them then all would be forgiven, before suddenly launching multiple dark spells and curses at her whilst the other laughed and egged him on.

Although Crystal had been expecting the attack, it did not prepare her for the pain, and she soon found herself down on her knees crying out in agony, if she were being objective, she could have said that this pain was nothing compared to the Crutacius curse that her parents were so fond of using on her, but it was hard to be objective when you were in that much pain. The remaining people then took turns to curse her whilst, presumably, Violet kept watch for Madam Pince, and kept up a silencing charm around the area.

After perhaps half an hour of curses being thrown Marius was apparently satisfied and left saying quietly to the blood soaked Crystal, "Next time you'll think twice about embarrassing Slytheins."

Despite her condition, lying in a blood soaked pile on the floor Crystal could not control her anger and asked him bitingly what exactly she had done as EVERYONE knew that it was the Marauders who had staged the prank and not her, after all, what possible reason could she have had for pissing him off when she knew this would be the consequence of doing so. In anger at her outburst Marius lashed out at her again before promptly turning and swishing out of the library with his smirking friends.

Angry at her own stupidity, for actually questioning a psycho like Marius, Crystal gingerly picked herself up off the ground and began to inspect the damage that Marius and the others had done to her. It was not good, that last hex had undoubtedly broken a rib and on top of that she was covered in multiple gashes, burns and bruises, it would take hours for a novice like her to fix this mess...

She had determined the first time that this had ever happened that she would never go to Madam Pomfrey with her injuries, the well meaning school nurse would ask far too many questions that she couldn't answer and if she ever did find out who was doing this to her, her siblings would be punished for their actions, and, if this happened, when she got home her parents would beat her so badly that they would make one of Marius' little 'sessions' look like a tea party in comparison. No, she could definitely not take the risk of anyone finding out, and that included keeping this from Sienna.

Crystal knew that Sienna, who was close to her own family, would not understand why Crystal was treated the way she by hers was and why she felt the need to keep silent about it. Sienna not being from an aristocratic pure blood family would not even be able to fully comprehend the world of dinner parties and shady familial alliances that Crystal came from and what it meant to these people for Crystal not to be a Slytherin. No one could possibly understand if they hadn't experienced it, and Crystal was not going to explain it to them, she wanted no-one's pity, she just wanted a way out.

Crystal realised, at an early age, that if she told anyone about her family, they would not believe her, her family was far too influential to allow such un savoury information about them to get very far, and she couldn't leave on her own, she had no where to go and no money, and she was not by nature a trusting person so she would not rely on anyone else for things. Her only hope, her way out, was to wait until she came of age at 17 and inherited a small amount of money left to her from her grandmother, with it she could start a new life, but for now she would have to wait.

Crystal sighed angrily snapping herself out of her reverie and getting back to the job at hand, healing her wounds. She was still angry with the Marauders for causing this, but there was, as usual, nothing she could do, so she would just have to get on with fixing herself up, and get over it. Fortunately Crystal did have some skill at healing, her grandmother Desralda had been descended from a long line of Celtic healers and had secretly taught Crystal the skill as well as the language of her ancestors, without the knowledge of Crystal's disapproving parents, so Crystal was quite adept at fixing small cuts and bruises, though the broken rib might prove to be a bit more of a challenge.

It took Crystal close to four hours to fix herself up enough to leave the library, though she was still in pain, she was now out well past curfew, as it was nearly midnight. The library had been closed for hours and she had to carefully sneak back to Ravenclaw tower being sure to avoid the evil school caretaker Pringle, surprisingly though, when she reached the dormitory she had found that Sienna was still not back from her date with Sirius...

Just want to say thank you, to hannahbanana616 and An Anti-Sheep Cheese Muffin (I'm so honoured that you put my story on your favourites list!), for being my first reviewers, it means a lot! XXXXXX


	4. Dumping Sienna, Crystal's Outburst

**Someone To Understand**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing except the plot and any OCs.**

**An Anti-Sheep Cheese Muufin, here is an update just for you!**

Sienna did not reappear in the Ravenclaw tower until the early hours of the next morning, wearing the same clothes as the night before and looking decidedly crumpled, though happy, and although she insisted on waking up Crystal to tell her how wonderful Sirius was, she point blank refused to say what exactly had happened, much to Crystal's concern. Crystal fervently hoped that her friend had not done anything stupid last night.

Still in considerable pain Crystal began to prepare for the day listening with concern to the unusually chirpy Sienna.

XXX

This pattern of Sienna going on dates with Sirius and returning in the early hours of the morning continued for a couple of weeks, along with Crystal's, far less enjoyable pattern, of beatings from her brother and his friends every time the Marauders pranked one of them, and considering that Marius was friends with Snape this was quite often. Crystal was furious with the Marauders for what they were doing to her, but to be fair to them, they honestly didn't know that they were the cause of her pain, or even that she was in pain, as, she was so practised at hiding it from people

Sienna herself was on cloud 9, she was completely in love with Sirius, and convinced he felt the same, Crystal had a sinking feeling that she knew why this was, Sienna firmly believed that she Sirius were meant to be together and failed to notice his interest in her waning.

XXX

Sirius himself had been having a great time with Sienna at first, she was pretty and fun and easily satisfied, truthfully he knew no more about her after six dates than he had done after the first date, but he was not particularly bothered, she was, after all, a girl and not a friend and he really had no interest in getting to know her. However after about two weeks of dating, he was bored and felt that the time was right to move on.

XXX

Remus was concerned, he had warned Sirius to treat Sienna kindly, she was, after all, a very nice girl, if a little naive, and it was he Remus who would still be forced to deal with her after their break up, as they were both prefects and would still see each other every week at the meetings, and he did not want to have to see her depressed, or worse still angry at him. However there was nothing Remus could do to prevent Sirius breaking up with her, he would just have to hope that Sienna took it well.

XXX

Meanwhile Rose Parker was ecstatic, the Ravenclaw girl had lasted even less long than she had expected and Sirius would soon be free again so she could continue her strategic pursuit of him. She couldn't wait for the break up!

XXX

It was Monday morning just before breakfast, exactly two weeks after he had first asked her out that Sirius dumped Sienna. He had hoped that she would take it well, it wasn't as though either of them had been in love, it was just a bit of fun, but even after he had explained this to her, she had still taken it badly, and had in fact burst into tears and rushed back to her dormitory. He shook his head in exasperation, he would never understand why girls reacted the way they did, after all, he couldn't imagine himself getting that worked up about a break up, there were, he realised much more important things in the world than girls, and growing up in the family he did he had learnt that from an early age.

At this present moment in time Sirius was becoming evermore concerned about the actions of that muggle hating psycho, Lord Voldemort, and his Death Eaters, or more precisely, his family's involvement with them, he strongly suspected that his cousin Bellatrix and her husband had joined them and felt that it was only a matter of time before his cousin Narcissa and his brother Regulus did the same. He was disgusted by all of them and the ideals they upheld but he was trapped with them, at least until he came of age.

By his family Sirius was ridiculed and abused, but he could do nothing to prevent it, he couldn't leave, he had no where to go and no money, and he couldn't tell his friends, not even James, they just wouldn't understand. He was completely trapped, at least for now, and he longed for a way out, for someone to understand what it was like to be part of the evil Black family, but set apart from them by being put in Gryffindor, but this, he felt sure, would never happen.

Sirius was, actually, pleased that he had been sorted into Gryffindor, but still, the beating he had got for this particular indiscretion had not been good, he cringed just thinking about it. Also his Gryffindor courage often got him into trouble, not letting him back down from his family when he knew he should, if only to save his own skin. However, Sirius was determined that no-one should know about his past, or his present problems, so he put on the front of being a happy go lucky rascal, it was, after all, better to be laughed at than pitied. Pity was one thing he couldn't stand.

It was with these, more morbid than usual thoughts, that Sirius Black entered the Great Hall for breakfast and promptly sat down at the Gryffindor table.

Sirius had been helping himself to breakfast for about ten minutes when suddenly he saw a black blur rushing towards. SLAP!

XXX

There was moment of stunned silence at the Gryffindor table. Sirius Black, quite possibly Hogwarts coolest guy and notorious womaniser, had just been slapped by some unknown Ravenclaw, for no apparent reason. No-one knew what to think, what on earth had just happened? They didn't have to wait long to find out...

XXX

When Crystal had seen Sienna go off with Sirius before breakfast, she had a feeling that something bad was going to happen, so she had followed at a discreet distance, close enough to be able to comfort her friend quickly if what she suspected was going to happen did happen. She was not disappointed. After talking with Sirius for barely five minutes Sienna had burst into tears and run off towards Ravenclaw Tower, and Crystal had had to run to keep up with her.

Once within Ravenclaw Tower Crystal had confronted Sienna and found out that not only had Sirius slept with her and then dumped her, he had also effectively broken her poor heart. Sienna was practically hysterical, and in no condition to go to class so Crystal comforted her as best she could, wiping away her tears, tucking her into bed and calling Sirius all manner of unpleasant names in an effort to soothe her.

However Crystal's outward appearance of calm was merely a screen to prevent her friend from seeing the bubbling anger building up, beneath the surface, towards that arrogant prick Sirius Black, he was going to pay for hurting her friend so badly! Didn't he know what a lovely person Sienna was, how could be do this to her?

It was with these furious thoughts running through her head that Crystal stormed out of Ravenclaw Tower to the Great Hall and towards her hapless quarry Sirius Black. She did not remember thinking about slapping Sirius, it simply seemed like the right thing to do given the circumstances, so she did, she had not intended to make a scene in the Great Hall, she usually avoided it at all costs, realising the dangers of doing so, but today she was too mad to care, she had to make Sirius realise that what he had done to Sienna was wrong.

Therefore, as, soon as she slapped Sirius Crystal began a tirade of abuse against him. "What the hell do you think you are playing at treating Sienna like that?", she began bitingly, her porcelain skin flushed with anger, "No wait I know, the 'Great' Sirius Black doesn't give a damn about the feelings of lesser mortals.", she stated bitterly, looking at Sirius, as though he were a cock roach, or some other such unsavoury creature, "He just does whatever the hell he wants no matter how much it hurts anyone else,", she paused to take a breath before continuing her furious rant, "do you have any idea how much she's hurting right now you prick?!" , she screeched before reaching out to try and slap him again.

XXX

If anyone had entered the Great Hall after Crystal's tirade, for a moment they would have been able to hear a pin drop, the hall was so silent, as it seemed that everyone had stopped to watch the unfolding scene, with apparent interest. It was, after all, not every day that Sirius Black, school ladies man, actually found himself on the receiving end of abuse from the opposite sex.

XXX

This last comment, however, seemed to have woken Sirius from out of his stupor, and he reacted in time to stand up and grab Crystal's wrist before her hand came in contact with his cheek again, it was still stinging from the last time she had slapped him!

"What the hell are you doing!", screeched Sirius at Crystal, still holding on firmly to her wrist, and seemingly oblivious to the eyes of half of the people in the Great Hall on him.

"What do you think I'm doing?" Crystal spat back angrily, trying unsuccessfully to wrench her wrist out of Sirius' grip, "I'm standing up for my friend, who you just used and dumped without taking into account her feelings, she's a human being Sirius,", she stressed patiently, as though explaining something to a small child, and throwing him a pitying look, "you can't just treat her like she doesn't matter!", she finished dramatically.

Sirius was stunned, no-one had ever stood up to him like that before, and here was this girl who he had never even talked to before, ranting at him and actually succeeding in making him feel guilty about how he had treated Sienna, a feat even Moony had failed to do before. He didn't know what to do, but he couldn't just let this incredible girl leave thinking that he was the biggest prick on earth, so when she continued to try and wrench her delicate wrist out of his grip, he held on harder twisting his hand further around her wrist, to make sure that she couldn't escape. He was shocked when at his actions a tear streaked down her porcelain cheek and a grimace of pain escaped her soft red lips, she was clearly in pain, but surely he had not been gripping her wrist that hard?

Feeling a complete sadist Sirius quickly dropped Crystal's wrist and watched in shock as she wiped the tear off her cheek, and, if possible, now looked even more angry at him than before for bringing attention to the fact that she was in pain, throwing one last withering look at him the girl stalked off nursing her clearly injured wrist and leaving a, once again, stunned Sirius in her wake.

It took Sirius a whole minute to realise that he was still standing, staring after her, with practically the whole school staring at him, and sit down again, but he was still in shock, what the hell had just happened? And how had that that strange girl, Crystal he remembered her name was, had managed to get under his skin so successfully when no-one else ever could? Why had she been in pain? And, most importantly, how was it that even when she had looked at him with pity, he had not been angry but instead felt instinctively that she understood, so it was alright for her to look at him like that?

XXX

"Who the fuck was that?" exclaimed James with awe, as Sirius returned to his seat, unconsciously voicing the thoughts of practically everyone in the Great Hall. He had never seen anyone successfully treat Sirius like that before and could not quite believe his eyes when that girl had slapped him. "Well?", he questioned Sirius, waving a hand in front of his face, he was shocked to see that his friend had not been listening to a word that he had said, but was instead still staring at the spot where the girl had disappeared from the Hall.

It was instead Remus who answered James' question "That was Crystal Maycomb, Sienna's best friend," he prompted "Remember?", he said referring to their conversation two weeks ago.

"Oh, yeah!", muttered James with dawning comprehension, "But I thought you said she was really shy!", he muttered incredulous at the actions of this supposedly 'shy' girl, who had just humiliated his best friend in front of the entire hall!

"I thought she was!", defended Remus sheepishly.

"She sure seemed shy!", laughed Peter sarcastically at last seeming to get over the shock of the encounter. The three Marauders promptly burst out laughing at their friend's misfortune in pissing Crystal off, failing to notice the approach of several people behind them...

XXX

Meanwhile Lily Evans and her friends were also discussing the encounter, and were also incredulous at the unknown girl's front at publicly attacking Sirius.

"Its about bloody time that someone stood up to him!", Lily announced vehemently, before realising a problem with this logic, "Although, it should have been Sienna standing up to him...", she trailed off looking pensive, two of her friends, Maya and Louise nodded their violent agreement about her assessment of the situation, but the other girl, Rose was clearly not listening and sat biting her lip.

"What the hell just happened here?", Rose thought frantically, "And why is Sirius still staring after her!", she inwardly screeched. Sienna had been no real competition, but this unknown girl was clearly going to upset her careful plans to capture Sirius, if his expression was anything to go by, "What was am I supposed to do now?!", she thought nervously chewing her lip.

XXX

Suddenly a shadow formed across the Gryffindor table and the three laughing Marauders promptly stopped and looked up, along with the still shell shocked Sirius, to see the four people that they liked least in the world glaring at them.

"Having a good breakfast brother?", began Regulus Black chirpily.

"Bugger off Regulus!", exclaimed Sirius loudly, he really wasn't in the mood to deal with his idiotic, Slytherin, younger brother now, nor did he particularly want to get into a fight with him and his friends, so he was not about to waste time on pleasantries, or even thinly veiled insults.

Fortunately this view appeared to be shared by one of Regulus' companions, a boy his own age, who was standing at the side of the group with Sirius' favourite punch bag, Severus Snape...

The boy had long black hair, reaching past his chin, chiselled aristocratic features and familiar cold blue eyes, he was wearing a no nonsense expression, and his whole countenance told you not to mess with him, this was Marius Maycomb, a boy he had been enemies with, along with his twin sister Violet, and Snape, since practically the first day of Hogwarts. He was a pure blood, like Sirius, but unlike Sirius he followed the rules set out by his family, and this made them instant enemies.

Looking Sirius straight in the eye he boldly announced "You had better stay away from my sister Black or there will be hell to pay!", with that said he silently turned around and stalked off with a sneering Violet and Snape seconding his opinion before also turning and following in his wake. This left only Regulus, and one last girl, whom Sirius recognised as being Marius' younger sister Abigail, staring at Sirius with a satisfied smirk crossing their faces, before they too linked hands and left.

XXX

Crystal meanwhile was still fuming. She had been marching angrily through the corridors for ten minutes, hoping to calm herself down somewhat before lessons started, and it wasn't working.

After her little scene in the Great Hall she was now even more angry with Sirius than she had been to start with! She would surely be punished severely by Marius for the incident, even if she had humiliated Sirius, which would surely please him, she had done it to defend her 'blood traitor' friend. But not only this was she worried about, Sirius had also managed, by refusing to let go of her wrist, still injured from the last beating, to expose to the entire school her weakness, and if there was one thing that her family had taught her, it was never to show weakness to anybody.

Even if the students, who were undoubtedly watching the scene with interest, had not noticed her reaction to Sirius gripping her wrist, she felt sure that one of the teachers would have, and that could only lead to questions that she couldn't afford to answer.

Merlin she hated Sirius Black!

**If you read, please review and tell me what you think, even if you don't like it, I want to know! Thanks! XXX**


	5. Detention With Sirius

**Someone To Understand**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing except the plot and any OCs.**

Sirius sat fuming, in silent contemplation of what he had just realised about Crystal. She was the sister of a guy that he had hated since first year, and now that he realised it he felt like an idiot for not seeing it before. How long had he known Marius and Violet for?

Also Maycomb wasn't exactly a common name, they were the only pure blood family who had it as a surname, so why hadn't he realised this when Moony told him what her name was, or even when he had first seen her, she did, after all, look a lot like Marius, they even had the same eyes, though, Crystal's eyes reminded Sirius of flames whilst Marius' were icy and cold. So why hadn't he realised?

Suddenly realisation hit Sirius like a bolt out of the blue, Crystal was in Ravenclaw, and that was why he hadn't made the connection between her and her siblings, Violet, Marius and Abigail, she was, like him, from an ancient pure blood family, and she should have been sorted into Slytherin, but like him she wasn't put there. He couldn't help but wonder why that was...

XXX

James was irritated, after the second interesting confrontation of the morning, Sirius had spaced out again, and his new spacey best friend was starting to irritate him. He was about to tell Sirius as much, when the group's, second, stunned silence of the morning was abruptly broken by McGonagall, she was positively fuming.

"Apparently she saw Crystal's little display", he thought wryly, "Sirius is definitely gonna get detention for this one, I bet he's still even too stunned to mount his usual defence!", James inwardly laughed waiting for the fireworks to begin.

He was not disappointed.

XXX

Sirius was rudely jerked out of his silent contemplations about Crystal by a very angry Professor McGonagall. She had clearly seen the fight earlier and, had probably after a few moments of either stunned silence, or internal hysterics at his expense, decided that punishment was in order for disturbing breakfast.

"And just what do you call that little display Mr Black?", she began dangerously, her eyes glittering with suppressed anger, "That was absolutely disgraceful and I am ashamed to have you in my house if you will insist on treating people like that, and causing scenes at breakfast!", she shouted furiously, her face flushing and her eyes narrowing dangerously, "Twenty points will be taken from Gryffindor, though none will be taken from Ravenclaw, as though Miss Maycomb's actions were rash, they came from a desire to defend her friend, so the intent was noble. Also yourself and Miss Maycomb will serve detention in the library at five pm tonight." At this point McGonagall paused, looking pensive, "Although I hate to inflict more of your presence on her perhaps a shared detention will put a stop to hostilities between the two of you, and any further fights over breakfast."

"But Professor", began James pleadingly, looking worriedly at his silent best friend, knowing full well that Sirius NEVER simply accepted punishment without trying to talk his way out of it, "You can't take points from Gryffindor but not Ravenclaw, Crystal started it!" he finished looking scandalised at the thought of Gryffindor loosing so many points at once.

"Silence Potter," McGonagall snapped irritated at his gall to try and talk her out of issuing a just punishment, "or you will also find yourself in detention tonight." McGonagall finished throwing warning look at James, as well as the other, so far silent Marauders. With that she walked away, after informing them that she would inform Crystal of her detention in her Transfiguration lesson before lunch.

It was Peter who talked first after she left, "That was so unfair!" , he squeaked indignantly, "She started it and you get punished!"

"If you want to go into detail," huffed Sirius testily, "I started it when I hurt Sienna's feelings." He said flopping down into his chair and pushing away his half eaten breakfast. He was clearly in a foul mood.

The other Marauders were meanwhile stunned, had Sirius actually admitted that that girl was right about what she had said to him, and that McGonagall was right to punish him? It was a very subdued group that headed to Defence Against the Dark Arts that morning.

XXX

Meanwhile Crystal had finally calmed down enough for her to arrive, five minutes late to Potions, her first lesson of the morning.

After receiving a ticking off from Professor Viero Crystal was instructed to join a group and get down to making their set potion.

She was annoyed to find herself quickly dragged into a group by her roommates, Mandy Corner and Patricia Boot but this annoyance quickly turned to shock when they, and all of the Hufflepuff girls in the classroom, began to thank her for standing up to Sirius the way she had.

Crystal couldn't believe that all of these girls, half of whom had gone out with Sirius, actually approved of what she had done, but it was starting to make her feel a little better about the situation. However her new good mood did not last long.

After double Potions on a Monday morning, the Ravenclaws then had Transfiguration, and as soon as she entered the Transfiguration class room Professor McGonagall approached her and explained to her about her forth coming detention with Sirius.

Now with a detention with Sirius Black looming on the horizon Crystal was once again in a foul mood. However this did not stop her from doing her duty, as a friend, to Sienna and, though it took the whole lunch hour to achieve, she eventually managed to convince Sienna to come to afternoon lessons, citing, as evidence, the scene at breakfast to prove that Sirius had had his comeuppance for the break up.

Sienna was still withdrawn during lessons that afternoon but she was feeling much better. All the teachers were sympathetic to her, having, for the most part, witnessed the fight between Crystal and Sirius at breakfast, and Sienna was pleased that Crystal had cared enough to stand up for her, though she was dismayed to hear that it had cost Crystal an evening detention, with none other than, that prick, as she had taken to calling him, Sirius Black.

That evening Crystal was forced to rush down to the Great Hall, while Sienna took her bag with her to Ravenclaw Tower, as soon as lessons were over, in order to grab a bite to eat before detention. As a result she was quite alone when she arrived in the library five minutes early for her detention...

XXX

Sirius meanwhile had not had such a good day. The 'Evans Crowd' had seemingly decided that he deserved what he got at breakfast, as had an alarming number of other girls, and to make matters worse, all the teachers knew as well and were far from sympathetic to his plight.

It was, therefore, a harassed Sirius who was forced to rush his dinner in the Great Hall in order to arrive at detention in time. However, he, unlike Crystal, was not alone when he entered the library, five minutes late as usual, as the other Marauders felt that he should have a guard of honour to protect him from Crystal, should she decide to attack him again.

Sirius was disappointed to note, when he arrived, that although he was five minutes late the librarian was no-where in sight yet. He was just about to tell the other Marauders to leave him to it when he heard voices in the far corner of the library.

Their curiosity getting the better of them Sirius and the other Marauders cautiously crossed the library to find the source of the voices...

XXX

As soon as Crystal saw them standing there waiting for her, with no librarian in sight she knew she was in trouble.

Marius looked positively furious, his ice blue eyes glinting with malevolence in the candlelight, whilst her sisters and their friends merely smirked, knowing that for Crystal there was no escape from them and no one to save her, once again they had her out numbered six to one and she knew that she didn't stand a chance.

"It would be easier," she mused, "and less painful in the long run, if I just stand there and let them get on with it." , but it was hard to do nothing, and she soon found herself, out of habit, trying to defend herself, though it didn't take them long to separate her from her wand.

Crystal soon found herself, in the familiar position, of being on her knees crying out in pain, a bloody gash searing across her left cheek. She longed for someone to save her but she knew, deep down, that it was never going to happen.

Crystal had learned long ago that it was no use hoping for a miracle, after all, hope was for idiots, she lived in the real world, and had learnt through harsh experience, that no matter how loud she screamed, no-one was ever coming to save her...

XXX

When Sirius rounded the corner the sight that met his eyes was one, that even in his worst nightmares he could not possibly have imagined.

Crystal was on her knees crying out in pain, her wand was lying a few feet away from her and there was a huge bloody gash across her left cheek, marring her beautiful face. Her intense blue eyes, which, he had only ever seen glowing with fire and strength were now dulled with hopelessness and fear as she gazed up at the face of her torturer, her brother Marius, whilst five more Slytherins, two of them her sisters', one Severus Snape and another, his own brother, Regulus looked on in amusement.

Sirius instantly felt somehow responsible for this situation, though he would not have been able to explain why. He felt an instant surge of protectiveness towards Crystal, and, as the Slytherins had not yet noticed the presence of the Marauders, being so engrossed in torturing Crystal, he cleared his throat dangerously to announce his presence...

The Slytherins instantly froze, hearing the unknown person clear their throat they had immediately assumed that it was a teacher or the librarian but, when they saw only the Marauders, their cockiness returned, though they still decided to beat a hasty retreat.

Shooting Sirius a last warning look Marius hurriedly left the library with the rest of his entourage, seemingly satisfied enough with shocking the Marauders than actually getting into a fight with them.

It was all Sirius could do not to hex Marius or his idiotic brother on the spot, for what they had done to Crystal, but somehow he kept his cool long enough to let the Slytherins leave.

For a moment the Marauders and Crystal remained frozen in place, none of them quite knowing how they should react in this situation. It was Remus who moved first rushing to Crystal's side, passing her her wand and helping her gingerly to her feet.

James for his part, Sirius knew, was completely stunned, as, unlike Sirius he had no idea why Crystal's own family would attack her. Similarly Remus and Peter were clearly not sure why this had happened to Crystal and, to her obvious dismay, each of them advocated telling a teacher and sending her to the hospital wing, realising that he would have to step in before one of his friends did something rash Sirius wearily ran a hand through his hair and patiently explained to them that, if they told the teachers what had happened it would only make Crystal's life worse.

Remus, James and Peter clearly disagreed, but deferring to their friends judgement they grudgingly agreed to say nothing. Pleased that he had managed to control his friends, and noticing Crystal's relief about them not involving the teachers.

Sirius then calmly told Crystal not to worry, and that they would get those 'slimy Slytherins' back themselves later.

XXX

It was at this point that Crystal snapped, she did not want Black and his friends pitying her, she did not need their help! It was their fault that Marius had even attacked her today!

Angry, Crystal, for the second time that day, completely lost her temper with Sirius and exploded. "I don't need your help Black!", she raged, "I can fight my own battles!", she paused glaring maliciously at Sirius as if silently daring him to interrupt her, and continued, "I don't need a knight in bloody shining armour, especially not a self righteous prick like you!", she finished nastily, standing up suddenly and trying not to grimace at the pain in her ribs this caused, she stalked off, well aware that she was now most likely late for her detention, as Madam Pince was sure to have arrived by now.

Sirius, not intending to let her escape so easily once again grabbed her arm and pulled her back to question her, "Well then," he began, "if you're so good at fighting your own battles, then how come, they were beating the living crap out of you!", he challenged angrily.

"Maybe because they had me out numbered six to one." Crystal replied sarcastically glaring at Sirius through her long lashes, trying desperately to pull away from his strong grip on her arm, her fierce blue eyes flashing with anger and embarrassment at being found by the Marauders of all people in such a state.

"Well why were they attacking you in the first place?" Sirius questioned curiously, hoping to shed some light on the situation.

Crystal was worried by his tone, Sirius could obviously guess, at, least partly, what that argument with her brother had been about, being in almost the same situation himself with his family, but she didn't want everyone to know her problems.

Completely ignoring the three other Marauders Crystal looked Sirius straight in the eye with such intensity that it caught him off guard and said quietly "Are you really so arrogant that you believe that you're the only one with problems in", she paused, not knowing how to continue so that Sirius would understand but the other Marauders would not, "**that **area." , she finished suggestively, before spinning on her heel and successfully managing to force the stunned Sirius to let her go.

She was clearly referring, subtly, to her less than perfect relationship with her Slytherin family, something she knew that Sirius would be able to relate to, if he would only stop being self absorbed, long enough to realise that he wasn't the only person on the planet with **that** particular problem.

Muttering obscenities under her breath about the Marauders she used her freedom from Sirius's grip to head off down the aisles of books towards the librarian's desk, stopping once along the way to perform a quick healing charm on the gash on her cheek.

XXX

Once again Crystal had succeeded in stunning Sirius, he had merely tried to be kind to her and figure out what was wrong, and she had once again blown up in his face, an event that he was rightly learning to fear, as, for a 'shy' girl Crystal had one hell of a temper.

Crystal had also managed to get him to re evaluate himself and his own actions for the second time that day, making him realise that she was right, and that they did have the same problem with their respective families.

Bidding goodbye to his fellow Marauders Sirius arrived at the detention ten minutes late and received a ticking off from the strict librarian.

Throughout the detention, Sirius tried unsuccessfully to capture Crystal's attention, but the girl simply ignored him, and for once in his life he was at a complete loss for what to do.

More surprisingly, to Sirius, the obvious gash on Crystal's cheek had disappeared, between her walking away from him and arriving at the detention. This led him to only one conclusion, one, which he did not like the sound of at all, if the gash had disappeared, then Crystal must have healed it, and this led him to believe, that if she had done this once, then how many other times had she done it, that he didn't know about?

Thank you to all my reviewers, I really appreciate your comments, and to anyone else who reads this please review, I want to know what you think!

Thanks! XXXX


	6. Aftermath

**Someone To Understand**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing except the plot and any OCs.**

A month had passed, since that fateful detention when Sirius had seen the kind of abuse that Crystal had to put up with from her family, it was now nearly Halloween, and Crystal was still avoiding him. In desperation Sirius had taken to watching her every time she entered the Great Hall, looking for signs that Marius was still hurting her. Disturbingly, more often than not he found them, and wondered how he could have been so blind as to miss them before.

Crystal often came into meals with a slight limp, or bruising across her arms, sometimes Sirius even saw her grimace in pain, whilst drawing in breath, though no-one else seemed to notice it, as, most of the time she was very good at hiding her injuries from prying eyes, or healing them as best she could herself, she had clearly had a lot of practise at it.

It broke Sirius' heart to see Crystal in pain, but there was really nothing he could do. He could try and watch over her but he wasn't in her year or house, nor was he one of her favourite people at the moment, so there was a limit to how much he could do. He flattered himself, that once or twice he had managed to ward off Marius and his thugs, without, Crystal noticing, but for the most part he was helpless.

Remus and James had tried to get Sirius to explain to them, how he and Crystal had the same problem but he had refused point blank to tell them anything, he agreed with Crystal, in that they didn't need to know, and couldn't possibly understand. He knew that he was hurting their feelings by not telling them, after all, Remus had shared his biggest secret with them, about being a werewolf, and James, was by nature an open person, and therefore told the group everything, but he did not waver in his decision to keep quiet.

XXX

Crystal herself was trying to get her life back to normal, though it was proving to be difficult when Marius still blamed her for Sirius walking in on them, and was taking, every possible opportunity, to take it out on her. She tried not to think about all the times she had run into him recently.

However Crystal's biggest problem was proving to be Sirius, she now regretted being as open with him as she had been, as he had now taken to watching her from across the Great Hall at every meal, it was beginning to unnerve her, being always under his scrutiny, and she was sure that with his constant observation of her he was learning more things about her than she was comfortable with him knowing.

Sirius had also still not given up with trying to talk to her, despite her best efforts to studiously avoid him, and she could not for the life of her understand why he was not giving up chasing her as she saw him do so often with other girls. All in all she was very uncomfortable with the situation, especially with the fact that Remus, James and Peter had also been exposed to her problem and had taken to looking at her pityingly whenever they thought that she wasn't looking. She was angry with them, the last thing she needed was the pity of the Marauders, and if Marius saw it, there would be hell to pay, "Maycombs do not inspire pity", he would tell her, "they inspire fear and respect!".

XXX

The change in the Marauders did not go unnoticed by their fellow 6th years, Lily Evans saw their concern, though she didn't know what it was for exactly, towards Crystal, as a sign that they were growing up, and that perhaps they were now mature enough to be friends with her.

Rose Parker should have been thrilled with Lily's sudden change of heart, it was after all, exactly what she was after, a chance to get the two groups to be friends. However she saw Sirius' concern for Crystal as an extreme threat to her play for his heart, though her relationship with him was progressing well, she realised that he cared far too much for Crystal's welfare for her to be entirely sure of his affection for her, and she often caught him staring over at the Ravenclaw table at Crystal. It unnerved Rose to think that this beautiful, young Ravenclaw, might steal Sirius from under her nose without even trying.

XXX

More time passed and soon it was the start of the Quidditch season, a timely distraction for all parties involved, as, James, Sirius and Rose played Quidditch on the Gryffindor Quidditch team, whilst Crystal played Quidditch for Ravenclaw. The constant practise and exertion meant that none of them had much time to dwell on their thoughts, and this was most definitely a good thing for everyone.

The first Qudditch games of the season, against Hufflepuff for both Gryffindor and Ravenclaw, through some strange twist of fate, passed without much difficulty for either team, Hufflepuff were notorious for being pushovers at Quidditch, and before anyone knew it, it was nearly Christmas.

XXX

For most people Christmas was a joyous time of year, but not to Sirius Black, not this year anyway. He had been looking forward to staying at Hogwarts for Christmas, or better still staying with James for the duration of the holidays but he had unfortunately received a very unexpected letter, which had forced him to cancel any plans, that he had had for Christmas and resign himself to a miserable holiday.

Sirius had been shocked when he had seen his family owl, after dropping a letter to Regulus, continue on to his side of the Great Hall and also drop him a letter. He had been more than a little curious about what his mother could possibly have to say to him but when he had read the letter the bottom had dropped out of his stomach.

It turned out that Sirius' evil cousin Narcissa had just got engaged to a particularly nasty, pure blood called Lucius Malfoy, and to celebrate their engagement, both the bride and groom had invited their families to spend Christmas with them at Malfoy Manor. So not only would Sirius have to go back to stay with his own horrible family for Christmas, he would also be spending, the entire holiday at Malfoy Manor, getting to know another equally horrible pure blood family, and worse still there was no way out of it. If he did not return home, his mother had warned him, he would be disowned by his family, and Sirius had no intention of allowing that to happen when he had no where else to go, and no money.

Sighing exasperatedly Sirius raked a hand through his silky black hair, pulling it out of his eyes, before wearily explaining the lamentable situation to his fellow Marauders, it was going to be a long holiday...

XXX

There was only one person at the Gryffindor table happy at the news that Sirius would be going home for Christmas. Rose Parker was relieved, she had been paranoid that Sirius would end up staying at Hogwarts alone with that Ravenclaw bitch, Crystal Maycomb, but if he was at home, or more specifically away from home then there was no chance that Crystal could sink her claws into Sirius whilst Rose was off the scene. It never occurred to Rose, a muggle born, how small the pure blood wizard social circle in Britain was, or that at home Sirius was probably more likely to be forced to spend time with Crystal than at school...

XXX

Meanwhile Sirius was not the only on to receive unexpected mail that day, as, a similar letter was, almost, simultaneously delivered to Crystal from her mother, explaining to her that she would still be coming home for Christmas, not that that was unusual.

Crystal's family forced her to come home for Christmas every year anyway, in order to show her off at ministry parties, as, as much as they hated the fact that Crystal was in Ravenclaw, it did wonders for the family's credibility of being 'good' wizards, in certain circles, if people believed that her family still supported her despite her being put in the 'wrong' house.

However this year, for Christmas, Crystal discovered that she was going to be going to Malfoy Manor with the rest of her family to celebrate the engagement of her mother's obnoxious nephew, and therefore her cousin, Lucius Malfoy to Narcissa Black. She was not looking forward to it, social gatherings with her family were always formal occasions filled with numerous, unfriendly, closed-minded bigots, who in Crystal's opinion did not deserve to know about magic. "It's going to be a long holiday!", she mused sadly.

XXX

As usually happens when you don't want something to happen, the days flew by for Crystal and Sirius, until the day of the train journey home for Christmas arrived. Both wished that the train journey would last forever, and neither party was looking forward to seeing their parents again. They were so distracted with their own problems, that, for the first time in nearly three months, each forgot about the other.

XXX

When the train finally arrived in London, Sirius was thoroughly depressed, this would surely be the worst Christmas holiday ever.

He had already changed into some hideous, in his opinion, black and silver dress robes of his mother's choosing, at her express instruction and was feeling hugely out of place amongst the casually dressed other students. The other Marauders especially had had a good laugh at his expense. This was not a good start to the holiday.

To his extreme consternation, when he reached his parents, he discovered that, even more alarmingly, he and his parents were to portkey straight to Malfoy Manor from the station, the nightmare was going to begin even earlier than he had expected!

After a quick warning from his mother about 'upholding the noble name of Black', he and Regulus, who was grinning like an idiot after watching Sirius get told off after barely 30 seconds of interaction with their parents, were instructed to grasp hold of a grand old umbrella that their mother was holding, whilst remembering to keep a firm hold on their trunks.

In mere seconds Sirius found himself, his parents and his brother to be standing in the grand entrance hall of a fine old country manor in front of a cowering house elf, who, quaking with fear, explained that its Masters' were currently out but that he had been informed of their arrival and, with their permission, he would stow away their luggage for them and show them to their rooms.

Sirius' mother grudgingly agreed to the creature's suggestions, and so with a click of its stubby fingers, the little creature quickly stowed their belongings' into their rooms' before bowing as lowly as possible and leading them towards their rooms'. Sirius himself was secretly relieved at the house elf's news that its masters' were out, he hated his cousin Narcissa and was not looking forward to seeing her again.

The only cousin, or family member in general, that he could stand was his cousin Andromeda, who had been disowned by the family some years before for marrying a muggle born. "It's typical," Sirius thought, "the one time my family produced someone halfway decent she was disowned, whilst idiots like Narcissa are welcomed with open arms.", it proved his point entirely about what idiots his family were.

The house elf quickly showed the family to their respective rooms, and Sirius was very relieved to see, that he would not be sharing a room with Regulus, if he had been forced to, he was quite sure that he would have killed his brother long before the end of the holiday.

Thanking the house elf, and flopping down on the luxurious four-poster bed, Sirius scrunched up his face and sighed, he really did not want to be in this house! He rolled over onto his stomach and buried his face into the pillow. The house elf had informed him that the gathering would begin at five and he had hours to kill till them, so he just lay on the bed, letting his helplessness overcome him.

At ten minutes to five Sirius got off the bed, and re adjusted his slightly crumpled dress robes, it was time to face the music, and his mother would skin him alive if he went downstairs looking like a crumpled mess. Sighing exasperatedly he checked his reflection in the mirror, and running a hand through his longish black hair, he stormed out of the room and down the grand marble staircase, back into the grand entrance hall, before turning, as instructed, to his left and finding a grand drawing room filled with a large amount of people.

Sirius entered the room as discreetly as possible, hoping, for once in his life, to remain unnoticed. It was however, not to be, his mother soon spotted him and forced him to make polite conversation with Lucius and Narcissa for a few torturous minutes, the conversation was however, long enough for Sirius to see that Narcissa and Lucius deserved each other, they were both, after all, vain, arrogant and cold. Leaving Narcissa and Lucius to it as quickly as he could afford to, with his mother breathing down his neck, Sirius hurried over to the far side of the room where he settled himself in an armchair, hoping to be allowed to merely observe the action without having to take part in any forced polite conversation with a room full of people who, were almost certainly, all Death Eaters, or if not Death Eaters, they at least shared their ideals.

Huffing in irritation at the situation Sirius began scanning the room for anything of interest, and it did not take him long for his eyes to land on a girl, probably his age, or a little younger with long curly black hair, wearing short sapphire blue, silky looking dress robes. She was undoubtedly one of Lucius' relatives' as he did not have any female relatives her age, and she, like him seemed slightly uncomfortable with the situation, as, instead of conversing with people she was staring absently into the fire.

Sirius could not explain why, but he was captivated by this girl and could not tear his gaze away from her. As if sensing his gaze the girl turned and Sirius gasped, as he suddenly found himself staring straight into the fierce ocean blue eyes of Crystal Maycomb...

**Thank you so much to everyone who reviewed, it means a lot to me to find out what people actually think of this story!**

**Thanks and please take the time to review and tell me what you think! ï XXX**


	7. Talking To Crystal

**Someone To Understand**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot and any OCs.**

As Crystal gazed absently into the fire, she became aware of someone behind her staring at her. She was angry at being forced to play the dutiful daughter at this party and had, in an effort to try and calm herself down taken to watching the flames dancing across the hearth of the fire place in the grand drawing room of Malfoy Manor. She was however also bored, and angry at being stared at, so, smoothing her short sapphire coloured silk dress robes she turned to confront whoever had been staring at her, and was shocked to find herself suddenly staring into the stormy grey eyes of Sirius Black.

Sirius was looking at her with a shocked, slightly glazed expression, whilst sitting in an arm chair in the far corner of the room, he was clearly, like her, attempting to hide from notice, and avoid unpleasant conversation, and she couldn't help noticing that he looked incredible. The poor lightening in the room gave his skin an eerie translucent quality, and caused shadows to form under his elegant high cheek-bones, he was wearing fine dress robes of black velvet with ornate silver embroidery and, as usual his silky black hair was falling into his eyes with casual elegance whilst his dark stormy grey eyes themselves were swirling with intensity. At that moment she could indeed see what the girls at Hogwarts meant when they said that he was 'sexy', sitting in that gloomy corner he looked rather like a brooding poet, all intensity and boxed up passion, a very alluring combination.

Angry, Crystal mentally slapped herself for her silent musings, this was, after all, Sirius Black, Hogwarts resident heart breaker! She could not think that he was 'sexy'!

Trying desperately not to blush under his gaze, Crystal reminded herself that he was merely an annoying pest that made her life hell, and thought he was God's gift to women, nothing more! However, try as she might to believe this, she could not quite succeed, hadn't he been driving her crazy the past few weeks trying to talk to her, and when that failed, watching her at every meal to check if she were safe and well? There was, also, something different about him, sitting alone, brooding in that armchair, trying to escape the notice of his family.

For once Sirius actually looked vulnerable, lost and alone, in a room full of people that he knew he could not trust, letting his guard drop for only a moment, to reveal what he was truly feeling believing, of course, that no-one was watching, and that there was therefore no reason to keep up the pretence of being invincible.

For once Crystal actually felt her heart soften towards Sirius, after all, here, sat, perhaps, the only person in the world, who could ever truly understand her.

Seemingly snapping out somewhat from his stunned state Sirius shuttered his eyes, bringing them back to their usual cocky, impassive form and wiped all emotion from his face, he, like Crystal was clearly skilled at hiding what he was truly feeling from the world behind a mask of unconcern and arrogance, a skill necessary to survive in aristocratic society and something which Crystal had to admit, she had not really noticed in him before.

After Sirius had rescued her from Marius in the library that day Crystal had asked him if he was really arrogant enough to believe that he was the only one with **these** type of problems with his family, but grudgingly she now realised that she had done the same. She had never really considered how rough he had it with his own family, sure she could guess, but seeing the proof sitting in front of her was quite another matter, it was just that Sirius always seemed so confident and arrogant, that it had never really occurred to her, that it could all be an act which he used to try and defend himself, in the same way that she used her supposed shyness as a shield of anonymity to protect her from the gazes of the people at school.

It seemed clear to Crystal in that moment that they were both trapped by the over-bearing aristocratic pure blood society that they had been born into, but she could not afford to use this as a reason to show weakness, for as much as she longed for someone to love and understand her, the way her family never could, she was not fool enough to really believe that Sirius Black could ever truly love anyone. Furthermore, it was hopeless to dream of such things, because even if Sirius Black could ever love, their families would never allow it, not that they would an object to an alliance between the Maycombs and the Blacks, but simply because neither side would be fool enough to allow an alliance between the 'white sheep of the Black family', and the Maycomb's 'bad egg',(Together they might, after all, find the strength to rebel, join the other side and reveal all the skeletons in the Black's and Maycomb's respective closets!), therefore a relationship would be too dangerous for both of them, and if they were disowned, neither had anywhere to go.

However, breaking out from her pensive musings and realising, for the first time all evening, that she was not completely alone at this horrible gathering, her heart rose, and she could not prevent herself from smiling at him, after all, despite her concerns, his company was preferable to her than no company, or worse still the company of anybody else in the room. So deciding that she might as well say 'hi', and generally give him a chance, if only for the duration of the holiday, she set off across the room to talk to him.

XXX

Sirius could not quite believe his eyes, "What is Crystal doing at this gathering, and why is she suddenly smiling at me and walking over here?", he frantically wondered as she made her approach.

Sirius realised that before Crystal had started walking she had got far too close a look at him with his defences lowered, he only hoped that he had shuttered his expression again in time to prevent any awkward questions, but he still could not help himself from smiling back as she approached, successfully wiping all thoughts of what she might have seen from his mind, with a mere smile.

She looked stunning in the firelight with her silky black girls held carefully out of her face by a pretty silver clip, and her face cast into shadow by the dim light of the room, leaving only her startling blue eyes clearly visible to him. Her sapphire blue dress robes were low cut, exposing her pale elegant shoulders, they clung to every curve, and, at her throat hung a silver and sapphire pendant of the Maycomb family crest, she looked absolutely incredible, an angel appearing out of the gloom.

In that moment Sirius wondered how he could ever have not noticed a creature like Crystal at school before, she was simply breath taking, everything about her was beautiful, including her movements, which were fluid and graceful. She seemed to radiate inner strength and serenity, though he knew that this must have been an illusion she projected, remembering the way she had looked when Marius was torturing her.

Crystal, Sirius realised, shocked, was just like him, having to hide who she really was from her family, having to bite her tongue when they said things she didn't agree with and having to paper over any cracks in her armour rather than let them know what she was feeling, knowing, as he did, that any weakness she showed, even to her family, could be used against her.

Breaking himself from the trance like state merely thinking about Crystal seemed to induce in him, Sirius smiled at her, eager for the chance to talk to her again, and prove to her, that despite his past behaviour, he was a decent human being, and did care for her, even if he had been a prick to her friend Sienna.

"Hi," Sirius began nervously looking up at Crystal, "I didn't expect to see you..." he trailed off, unsure of what to say, and unsure of even how to act. Groaning inwardly he stopped, angry with himself, he **always** knew how to talk to girls, he was never nervous!

"What?", she questioned him, saving him from further embarrassment, and an awkward silence, "Here at Death Eaters R'US", she commented dryly, her blue eyes twinkling with amusement, before continuing more seriously, "Well I didn't intend to be here but my parents said that they'd disown me if I didn't come, since Lucius is my cousin." She finished looking slightly concerned at the idea, which in Sirius', albeit coloured opinion, made her look even more beautiful.

"Same," admitted Sirius darkly, "Narcissa's my cousin, as you may have guessed, so I had to come," he explained, "Personally I would have preferred to spend Christmas at Hogwarts like usual, but what can you do?" he finished staring irritatedly over at his parents, knowing that Crystal would understand what he meant without him having to explain, like he would have had to do with anyone else, even James.

Crystal gazed at him kindly, her blue eyes filled with concern and sympathy, a look, he discovered, that he didn't mind if directed at him by her, though he would have minded had anyone else done it. She then reached out and, to Sirius' shock, squeezed his hand, in a friendly gesture smiling at him and saying kindly, "Well at least your parents let you stay at Hogwarts for Christmas sometimes," she told him, "mine never do.", she admitted sadly casting her face down towards the floor with seeming shame at her admission, this was the first time she had ever really shown Sirius any sign of weakness willingly, and he was momentarily stunned, but then, letting his need to comfort her take over, he reacted without speaking.

Carefully, Sirius, his hand still tingling with excitement from where she had squeezed it, reached out and cupped her chin gently with his hand forcing her to look up at him again, whilst gently running his other hand across her porcelain cheek and giving her an intense look, which clearly said, "That is not your fault, you have nothing to be ashamed of.", before smiling at her kindly and dropping his hands from her face, slightly embarrassed at how strongly he had reacted to her admission and trying desperately not to blush. Crystal had been slightly shocked at his actions, but she had made no move to move away from him, for which he was truly grateful, how was it that this girl could get him so worked up and embarrassed by doing practically nothing?

Hoping to change the subject to something that Crystal would find more comfortable he gently offered her his arm and suggested that they go to the buffet to get something to eat. Fortunately she accepted his offer and, arm in arm they headed towards the buffet.

Sirius could not believe his luck in running into Crystal at this horrible party, no girl had ever made him feel like this before, she hadn't even kissed him, in fact she was barely touching him but his heart was still beating a mile a minute, his hands were clammy, he was nervous, and every time she touched him it sent shivers down his spine and made his skin tingle with excitement.

XXX

Crystal herself could not believe how kind and considerate Sirius was being to her, the way he had reacted to her accidental admission, especially surprising her with its tenderness, "Is this the same jerk from school who so casually broke Sienna's heart, or has he really changed?", she wondered silently as he gently took her arm in his and led her swiftly towards the buffet, eliciting tingles all along her arm where their bodies touched.

At the buffet itself, he was a perfect gentleman, filling her plate for her and carrying it to a table, it was hard to believe that he had ever been that arrogant prat that had made her life so difficult.

They sat talking together at the table, long after they had finished eating, they talked about anything and everything, no subject was out of bounds, even the things that they could not discuss with their closest friends, it was as though they instinctively understood each other and much of the time, words were not even necessary to get across what they were feeling, they were so in tune with each other, it was as though they had known each other for years.

However, their conversation did not go unnoticed for long, and it was Marius and Regulus, their two biggest problems that discovered them talking together. Sirius was the first to notice their observation, and suggested that they move, however, Crystal knew better, if they moved her brother would only follow them, so if they were going to loose him, then they would have to go somewhere where he couldn't follow, like the dance floor...

Realising their opportunity she grabbed Sirius's hand and, her heart beating a million miles a minute, explained to him in hushed whispers her plan of escape, whilst he wrapped his strong arms around her and began steering her around the dance floor. Trying not to let herself get too distracted by Sirius' close proximity, she kept Regulus and Marius in her sights whilst Sirius subtly steered them off the dance floor and out of the room.

Crystal was ecstatic, her plan had worked, Marius and Regulus had not seen them leave, and would now, have no idea where to find them, or so she thought. These illusions were quickly shattered however, when the two people she least wanted to see suddenly appeared from the drawing room. Fortunately Sirius had seen them first, and, still holding her from the dance, had pulled her with him, to hide behind a large statue of a basalisk where they were concealed, quite effectively, by the bulky marble snake, and could not be seen by either Marius, or Regulus, though it had been close.

They waited a minute, Crystal wrapped in Sirius' arms, the gap they had wedged themselves into being quite small and there not really being enough room for two people, and watched as Marius and Regulus left in different directions to search for them. Crystal looked up at Sirius and smirked, they had clearly won this round!

XXX

Pleased to have lost Marius and Regulus Sirius sighed with relief, unconsciously wrapping his arms tighter around Crystal and breathing in deeply the scent of her silky ebony coloured hair. It was only at her slight, unconscious, movement in his arms that he realised what he was doing, and blushing, and sighing with irritation at having to let her go he carefully dislodged them from their hiding place, removing his arms reluctantly from around her waist and respectfully stepping back a step.

"Well what shall we do now?", questioned Sirius hesitantly, his voice not coming out nearly as strongly as he would have liked, as he looked Crystal straight in her intense ocean blue eyes.

"Well I don't know about you," began Crystal quietly, "but I've no intention of going back in there again, I've already made the social rounds, and..." she started hesitantly, as if afraid to tell him something, before carrying on regardless, and saying it anyway, "Regulus is starting to creep me out, he keeps asking to dance, and I just don't trust him, aside from the fact that Abbie already considers him her property and Marius would therefore kill me if I went anywhere near him."

Sirius looked at Crystal intently for a minute, momentarily shocked that even Regulus would be so stupid as to try and mess with the Maycombs, but seeing nothing but truth in her eyes, he answered her simply. "Yeah, I'm not going back in there either", he began seriously, before considering carefully what he said next, "There is probably somewhere we can hide out in this house, although I don't much fancy being caught in one of the security spells that are doubtless everywhere..." he trailed off, not sure what to say next, and desperately not wanting to suggest one place where he knew they could go, realising that with his reputation, Crystal was not likely to agree to it.

"We could always just hang out in one of our rooms then", began Crystal innocently, suggesting calmly what Sirius had been afraid to, "I don't know about you," she started again, looking even more nervous, "but I don't much like the thought of being alone in my room in this house with all **these** people." She explained carefully, looking down with shame at admitting that being with her own family frightened her.

"Yeah," Sirius answered, "I can see why you'd feel that way." , he whole-heartedly agreed with her, and though he would never admit it, the thought of being alone in a house with so many Death Eaters, had been praying on his mind a lot, in the days leading up to the holiday, and he was glad to know now, that he was not entirely alone in the house.

"Well shall we go to my room then?", Crystal asked him tentatively determinedly looking anywhere but Sirius, "We can hide there until the party breaks up." She finished logically, finally looking him in the eye again, piecing him with her fierce blue gaze.

"Sure," Sirius answered happily, pleased to be spending more time with her, and emboldened by her nervousness, he took her hand gently in his, squeezing it and giving her a smile, whilst gesturing with his other hand for her to lead the way.

XXX

Pleased at his consent, Crystal could not help beaming at Sirius before turning to lead the way through the many passages of Malfoy Manor, to her room on the second floor of the east wing. She silently berated herself for being so transparent about how much she wanted him to stay with her, after all, she was not in the habit of showing people what she was feeling, as it was usually not a tactically wise thing to do with her family.

Arriving at the old oak door at the entrance to her room's Crystal again turned to Sirius and smiled, opening the door and gesturing for him to come inside politely. However her outward calm demeanour masked her turbulent inner emotions, on the one hand she did not want to admit, even to her self, that she needed anyone, especially not Sirius, whilst on the other she desperately wanted someone to stay with her in her room that night, protect her, the way she had never been protected before, from anyone who might wish to hurt her.

Irritated with herself for her internal conflict and weakness Crystal followed Sirius into the room, closed the door behind her and turned the key in the lock, remembering that though normally a lock wouldn't stop Marius, now, outside of school he could not perform magic to break in. She smiled nervously at Sirius and watched as he, feigning confidence, sprawled out on the bed, the only uncluttered piece of furniture in the room, considering that she had, in her haste to get dressed, covered the only sofa in dozens of expensive dress robes.

Finally able to let her guards down, after an evening of mental torture, which only her strict social conditioning had enabled her to survive, Crystal flopped down onto the bed beside Sirius and promptly buried her head into a soft, purple velvet throw pillow, sighing tiredly and removing the silver clip from her hair, placing it on a bedside table. The evening had been even worse than she had expected, with Marius following her every move with his eyes, she knew that the next time he had a chance, he would make her pay for every tiny mistake, that she had made that night, the thought terrified her, and despite her large amount of practice, at these situations, she could not help but feel tears prickling at the corners of her eyes, though she was determined not to cry.

To her shock, after several moments of silence on his part, Sirius, almost seeming to read Crystal's mood, brought his arms softly around her waist and buried his head in her hair, not saying anything, just holding her and understanding. In that moment Crystal lost whatever tenuous hold she had had over her emotions, and cried, not sobbing, simply letting the tears slide down her face in silence. She cried for every time in her life that she had wanted to cry, and couldn't because of her fear of showing weakness, she cried for every time she had been beaten as a child, instead of hugged, she cried for the life she could have had, had she not been a Maycomb, and said nothing, she didn't need to, she knew he felt it too.

After several hours of sobbing Crystal fell into a fitful sleep in Sirius' arms, forgetting that she didn't trust him, for once in her life, forgetting to think at all, just simply existing and being secure in the knowledge that, for the first time, she was being held by someone who understood, who cared, who loved her...

**Thanks to everyone who reviewed, and to anyone else reading this, please review and tell me what you think!**

**Thanks! XXXXXX**


	8. The Morning After

**Someone To Understand**

Sirius awoke early the next morning to the dawn light shining into his eyes through the open hangings of the four-poster bed. Before suddenly snapping his eyes open and going rigid, he **knew **that he never left his hangings open, so what was going on?

Looking down to see a head of shiny ebony curls lying on his chest, the owner sleeping peacefully, draped across his chest, her legs entwined with his, the night before suddenly came flooding back to him, going up to Crystal's room, lying on the bed next to her, holding her tightly, in silent understanding, as tears slid down her porcelain cheeks, watching as she fell asleep, pulling the soft purple velvet comforter over both of them, to keep them warm, and finally falling asleep himself, with his head buried in her soft rose scented hair...

Sirius closed his eyes again, trying desperately not to move and wake Crystal, he knew what her reaction to this situation would be, he understood, people like them never showed weakness, it was an unwritten rule, that she had broken last night, and she would now simply get up, and pretend that this had never happened, embarrassed at her show of weakness.

Sirius himself never wanted this moment to end, sure he had had girls in his arms before, but not like this, he respected Crystal as a person, she was so strong and passionate, she, like him stood up for her friends, and though humiliating, Sirius had to admit, that that stunt in the Great Hall, had distinctly impressed him, and he could tell that no matter how hard things got with her family, she would not give up, and someday she would escape them, she gave him hope that maybe he could do the same, and that he was not alone in this struggle.

He looked down and tried to memorise every detail, how the sunlight glinting on her hair brought out the red steaks in it, and made it look like there were flames dancing in it as it cascaded in unruly curls over the pillow, how her soft red lips curved into a smile as she snuggled ever closer into his chest, how even when he, out of respect for her, tried to edge away, she unconsciously pulled him closer, placing her soft curvy body flush up against himself. He closed his eyes and could not help a small contented sigh from escaping his lips, he wouldn't mind waking up to this every day...

"WAIT", Sirius's mind screeched inwardly, as his body again went rigid from shock, "Did I Sirius Alexander Black just say that I wanted to wake up every day to the same girl!", he questioned inwardly, "Where the hell did that come from?", he wondered quietly, though he knew exactly where it had come from. Crystal was like no-one else in the world, she understood him and he respected her, more than that, he was infatuated with her, she was on his mind 24 hours a day, seven days a week, she was even there when he closed his eyes, and when he thought of not seeing her, his heart broke. But he couldn't LOVE her, that would be just too inconvenient, they were both already marked by their families, and surely no relationship was worth that much trouble, though even as he thought it the words did not ring true when used to describe a relationship with the exquisite Crystal.

XXX

Crystal awoke that morning, some time after Sirius, to a pair of strong muscled arms wrapped around her waist. Groggily she snuggled deeper into the warm welcoming arms before snapping awake when she realised that there should not be someone in her bed with her. "But wait", she thought tentatively, "Why am I still in my dress robes?". Realising what had happened Crystal flushed with embarrassment, she had started crying when Sirius wrapped his arms around her! And here she was snuggled into the arms of the great womaniser Sirius Black, his arms around her waist, her head resting on his hard muscled chest, enabling her to listen to his strong, soothing heartbeat,, their bodies flush up against each other, and their legs tangled together. Worse still, she did not actually mind this particular position, she just felt so right, so safe in his arms, she wouldn't mind waking up to this every morning...

She mentally slapped herself for the last comment, this was, after all, Sirius Black, he was not to be trusted, he broke girls' hearts for fun and cared nothing for the consequences, he was arrogant and self righteous, wrong for her in every way, including family, but yet she knew that he understood her, and despite her better judgement, and internal protestations to the contrary, she trusted him, maybe even loved him.

However she knew that she could not love him, she had been through this before, and no matter how much they had in common, it would be worth more than either of their lives were worth if their families ever found out...

Snapping herself out of her internal reverie, and regretfully, tearing her self away from Sirius, leaving the warmth of his strong arms, she climbed determinedly out of bed, surprising Sirius, and successfully shaking him out of his day dreaming state. Without turning to look at him, Crystal grabbed her wash bag and a change of clothes, and hurried in to the bathroom, she was horribly embarrassed about what had happened, and at that moment she didn't think that she could bear looking at Sirius with the knowledge of how vulnerable she must have seemed to him last night. Sinking to the floor in the corner of the huge marble en suite bathroom she sighed, putting her head in her hands, and thought disgustedly about how she had acted last night, like she had needed Sirius, the way girls she laughed at seemed to 'need' a guy. Getting up, she looked at herself in the mirror determinedly and realised that for both their sakes, she could not afford to do that again, and hoping to wash away her fears, she stepped into the shower and turned the water on as hard and hot as she could stand.

XXX

Despite his prediction of Crystal acting exactly the way she had done, Sirius was still slightly stunned by the way she had leapt out of bed, grabbed some clothes and then torn out of the room, like she was allergic to him, he groaned, irritated with himself, and raking a hand through his slightly mussed elegant black hair, he realised that he should have left earlier, before she awoke and freaked out, however, at the time, he just could not bring himself to leave her, not when she looked so enticing, and vulnerable.

Angry with himself, Sirius too reluctantly crawled out of the soft warm bed, he could now hear running water in the bathroom and knew that Crystal was in the shower, but he couldn't stay, it was now nearly 7:30, breakfast was at 8:00, and the whole house would be waking soon, he could not afford to wait and be caught in Crystal's room. Logically Sirius also realised that the reason Crystal had left in such a hurry, was because she was embarrassed, and therefore she would need some space, and would not appreciate him waiting for her in the room, not after last night...

So Sirius, for once in his life, did the logical thing, he left her a note, which read;

_Dear Crystal,_

_I know that you're embarrassed about last night, but don't be, it isn't good to keep emotions like that bottled up, and I understand how you're feeling, like you said before, we have the same problem, so I get it. Anyway, please don't try and avoid me, you're the only person in this house that I can stand right now, I won't survive the whole holiday here without you! I don't regret anything about last night, and you shouldn't either, I'm here if you ever need to talk,_

_All my love,_

_Sirius_

"Remus would be proud", Sirius thought happily, "I told her how I feel, that I'll be there for her, and I respected her feeling by leaving, Merlin I'm turning into a girl!" he exclaimed silently to himself.

Sirius then carefully turned the key in Crystal's door, and crept out into the dimly lit corridor, before attempting to try and find his way back to his room in the West Wing of the house, through the maze of long stone floored passages. It took him 20 minutes to find his way back to his room, and not a moment too soon either, as, as soon as his door was safely closed Sirius began to hear voices in the corridors, it was nearly 8:00, and people were clearly starting to head down stairs for breakfast.

Irritated that he wouldn't be able to go back to sleep, Sirius quickly showered and brushed his teeth, before changing into some elegant midnight blue dress robes, with silver etchings, muggle clothes, were obviously strictly out of bounds, in a house full of pure blood fanatics, taking one final look in the mirror, to fix his hair, he quickly left the room at 7:55, not intending to draw attention to himself, by being late for breakfast with his delightful family.

He arrived to find the table half full, and, seeing Crystal already seated at the far end, as far away from the other children their age as possible, decided there and then to join her, regardless of the consequences. She was wearing soft purple velvet dress robes in flowing material, and her hair was loose about her face, and still slightly damp from the shower, whilst the same silver and sapphire Maycomb family crest necklace, glinted around her throat and sapphire drop earrings, glittered at her ears, she locked lovely, regal, a true aristocrat, as, unknowingly, did he, they were each, after all, born and bred to play these parts.

As he approached, she looked up from her cereal, seemingly sensing his gaze, and gave him a swift weak smile, before turning to listen to an older woman, who looked remarkably like her, and appeared to be berating her for something. Sirius was indignant on her behalf, what right did that woman, even if she was her mother, have to tell Crystal what to do? Again, Crystal, seeming to sense his thoughts, looked up, and shot him a warning look, telling him, that there was nothing that he could do to help her, so, he should, just stay out of it. For once in his life Sirius actually listened to someone else, and, for the time being at least, he did nothing, shocked that Crystal could have that effect on him. He turned slowly, and as inconspicuously as possible, sensibly placed himself a few seats away from Crystal, where he was joined, much to his consternation, by his idiot brother Regulus...

XXX

Crystal, upon sensing Sirius' gaze as he entered the dining room, despite the events of last night, could not help shooting him a weak smile, she had appreciated the letter that he had left her this morning, normally such a thing would have irritated her, but coming from someone she knew understood, it didn't seem quite so bad, however she was still angry with herself for falling apart like that, and was not quite ready to talk to him again, yet, so she planned to spend the rest of the holiday avoiding him.

Snapping herself out of her internal musings Crystal turned back to her mother, who was lecturing her, about everything that she had done wrong last night, chancing another look at Sirius, she knew immediately what he was thinking, he was angry on her behalf, and, unless she did something, pretty quickly, he would end up getting involved in the conversation, and cause a scene, realising this all in a split second, Crystal carefully shot him a warning look, inwardly praying that he was still thinking clearly enough to catch her meaning and back off. She was angry with him for that, she had, after all, told him before that she did not need a knight in shining armour, she could take care of herself, and the last thing she needed right now, was for him to bulldoze in with his stupid Gryffindor courage, causing a scene and making her life more difficult than it already was.

To Crystal's immense shock, Sirius actually appeared to listen to her, and promptly sat down, at a sensible distance, a few seats away from her. Inwardly she was puzzled, though her face, carefully impassive, as always, did not betray this emotion, had Sirius Black actually just listened to someone other than himself? Trying hard not to shrug, Crystal quickly dismissed all thoughts of Sirius from her head, she could not afford not to listen to her mother, and if she was caught being inattentive again, she knew that the ramifications of such action, would not be at all pleasant.

However unbeknownst to Crystal, her whole silent conversation with Sirius, had been noticed by none other than her brute of an older brother Marius, he had been watching Crystal's conversation with their mother intently, making note of all the things that he would have to punish Crystal for, when, he had noticed, for the second time in two days, his sister's strange behaviour towards the 'white sheep of the Black family', he was not happy about the situation at all...

XXX

Sirius, at first, did not notice Regulus' approach, and was therefore shocked, when the brother he never talked to, except to insult, plopped himself down in the elegant chair next to him, he could not imagine what Regulus could possibly have to say to him, but he knew that it could not be anything good...

Wearily deciding that he might as well make the first move Sirius started the conversation, "What do you want Regulus? I would have thought you'd be sitting over there," Sirius said curiously, gesturing over to the other side of the table, where Marius, Violet and Abigail were sitting, conversing in ominous whispers.

"Well dear brother..." began Regulus silkily.

"Forget the 'dear brother' crap Regulus, what do you want?" Sirius interrupted angrily, feeling in no mood to play his usual obligatory mind games with his obnoxious younger brother.

"Well since you put it that way..." began Regulus evilly, "I just thought I should tell you, that we'll be watching you and **her**, so you had better not try anything" hinted Regulus maliciously, seemingly pleased to have finally got one over on his 'invincible' older brother.

"Regulus what the hell are you babbling about?", questioned Sirius, seemingly unfazed by the conversation, though his heart was beating fit to burst through his chest at any moment, what did Regulus know about him and Crystal, surely he had not seen that much last night? Did Marius know as well? "You are making even less sense than usual, a feat I didn't think possible before now..." began Sirius, shooting his bother a menacing stare, which clearly told him to leave.

"Now, now Sirius," started Regulus silkily, retaining his confident demeanour, despite Sirius' implied threat, he was of course used to such threats, "Don't hex the messenger," he stated, grinning insanely as he saw Sirius eyes flicker involuntarily towards the group on the opposite side of the table, just in time to see Marius give him a jaunty little wave and a truly evil smirk, "After all, there are no Marauders to back you up here..." he stated confidently, allowing the truth of his words to sink in before continuing, "So you would be wise not to upset us, unless you want to end up on our list, like someone else we all know.", finished Regulus coolly, allowing his eyes to settle on Crystal for a brief moment before turning back to look into his brother's, clearly angry, stormy grey eyes, with his own cold slate coloured eyes before slowly getting up from his chair, and moving away to join his friends.

Sirius was inwardly fuming, he knew that he had allowed Regulus to win that argument far too easily, but what could he do? As his brother had so helpfully pointed out to him, he had no friends to back him up here, and he could not even do magic outside of school, if they chose to attack him, he would be completely at their mercies and would not even be able to tell anyone, as the adults would be on the side of Marius and his goons.

Sirius suddenly realised what it must have always been like for Crystal, she could not possibly defend herself against three siblings, even with magic, and never had anyone that she could tell, anyone to protect her. Sirius himself had been lucky, although his parents could be brutal, their influence did not extend to Hogwarts, and he only had one younger sibling, so even if Regulus did attempt to attack him, which happened sometimes, Sirius usually had the upper hand in a fight, and always had back up, in the form of the Marauders, who he knew that he could trust to be there no matter what, even if he didn't always tell them everything. Gryffindors also always stuck together, so even if he hadn't had the Marauders support, he knew that he could rely on anyone else in his house to help, should he need, or want it, Crystal on the other hand, did not have anyone to stick up for her. Ravenclaws, although not cowards, like Slytherins, rarely did anything for anyone, unless they could see the direct benefit to themselves, and Sirius knew, from his observations of Crystal before the holidays, that aside from Sienna, who would not understand, or prove to be very effective in a duel, Crystal had hardly any other close friends, or people that she could rely on in an emergency. For once in his life, Sirius Black actually felt lucky, to have the life that he did...


	9. Run Ins With Family

Someone To Understand

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot and any OCs.**

After breakfast, Sirius immediately left the dining room, and hurriedly began to think of places that he could use to hide from the rest of the guests, he did not want his mother, or anyone else, for that matter to find him and force him to spend the morning, either conversing about business or politics with the adults or 'playing' with the other children, both of which he felt would be a highly unpleasant experience. However he was not fast enough in his swift exit of the room, and was soon collared by his irritated looking mother...

XXX

Crystal meanwhile, had just escaped from her, far from pleasant 'conversation' with her own mother, and having the same thoughts about the day's events, had promptly tried to escape the dining room without notice, she too failed...

"Well, hello there Crys." began a horribly familiar voice, "You wouldn't be trying to sneak away from us now would you?" hissed Abigail, in a seemingly sweet voice.

Turning to face her sister Crystal groaned, she had hoped to avoid a confrontation like this, for at least a few hours, "But at least," mused Crystal silently, "in such an open hall way they won't risk doing anything to me, the adults may agree with what they're doing, beating the rebelliousness out of me, but they won't appreciate seeing it first hand. Also they can't do magic outside of school, so there will be a limit to how much damage they can do without it.", she reasoned logically, hoping to give herself courage, by analysing the situation carefully.

Determined not to show her siblings that she was in any way afraid of them, Crystal looked up challengingly, her ocean blue eyes fierce, to see Marius looking back at her, his cold blue eyes narrowed with anger, glaring at her, and flanked by her equally angry looking sisters, Violet and Abigail, fortunately Regulus was no where to be seen, for which she was grateful, but still, the odds were not at all in her favour.

"Of course not Abbie, don't be silly.", scoffed Crystal, "Why would I try and sneak away from you guys?", questioned Crystal innocently, trying to keep the sarcasm in her voice to a minimum.

"Why don't you tell us Crys," started Marius dangerously, his eyes glittering with suppressed fury, as he began to walk towards her, causing her to, involuntarily, back herself into a wall, "Could it be that you've been screwing around with Sirius and were afraid of our reactions to this disgusting piece of news?" he asked her calmly.

Scolding herself for loosing her nerve, and allowing Marius to back her into a wall, effectively trapping her, and hiding her from view, Crystal brought her chin up proudly, and looked him straight in the eye, answering calmly, without a single tremor, that she didn't know what he was talking about.

"Liar!" hissed Violet nastily, "We saw you dancing with that disgusting blood traitor last night!", stepping out from behind Marius and glaring furiously at her little sister.

"And then there was that little display over breakfast..." began Marius suggestively, Violet and Abigail staring at him, clearly hearing this particular piece of news for the first time.

Abigail looked horrified, but also almost concerned, "Crystal," she began seriously, "you know that you can't have anything to do with Sirius, you know what he is! He may be a Black, but he's a blood traitor, a Gryffindor, and a mudblood lover, he can't be trusted, and if you're seen to sympathise with him the Dark Lord will tar both of you with the same brush!" she finished dramatically, a note of pleading in her would be calm voice.

"Don't bother Abbie", Marius interrupted, before Crystal had a chance to answer, "if beating it out of her doesn't work, what chance do you think you have, just talking to her? She won't listen, and the Dark Lord has no patience for fools."

"Then it's a good thing that I don't give a damn what he thinks then isn't it!" spat Crystal angrily, foolishly allowing her anger at the conversation, and being told what to do, to over ride her common sense. She was furious, but immediately realised her mistake, when Marius slammed the back of his hand hard across her face.

"Never speak badly of the Dark Lord Crystal!" spat Marius, shaking with fury at her words, and close to physically attacking her.

"Why?" spat back Crystal, past caring about what he was likely to do to her, for this latest outburst, already feeling her cheek begin to swell and throb with pain where he had hit her, tears prickling at the corners of her eyes that she knew she couldn't afford to shed, "Are you afraid of your master then Marius?" she asked innocently, shooting Marius a pitying look, that she knew she would pay for later.

"Don't talk about things that you don't understand!" shouted Marius angrily, loosing all semblance of control over his emotions and striking out at her again, knocking Crystal to the floor with the force of the blow.

To her intense surprise Crystal then saw Violet step in front of Marius preventing him from hitting her again. Violet then shot him a warning look, as if he had broken some unknown agreement, "This isn't what we came here to do!" she hissed at him angrily, before turning to her fallen younger sister, lowering herself to her eye level, and, looking intently into her eyes, saying, "You don't have to be on the outside you know", she paused for a second, as if carefully considering her next words and said quietly, almost kindly, "You could join us you know, just leave the blood traitors and muggle borns that you hang out with."

Frightened but resolute, Crystal shook her head softly at Violet's suggestion, and, looking into Violet's pale blue eyes, quietly answered, in a voice of steel "Never." , she was not going to be dictated to by her family, no matter what the cost...

Violet shook her head softly at this exclamation, and looked at Crystal, pity and disgust written all over her face, before standing back up beside Marius and Abigail. Marius himself looked positively livid at his sister's front, in refusing their generous offer, whilst Abigail just looked surprisingly pitying about something... "You don't believe that he loves you do you?", questioned Abigail incredulously, though there was an undertone of concern to her voice.

"Do I look like a complete fool?" Crystal snapped irritably at her younger sister, of course she didn't believe that, this was still Sirius Black that they were talking about, even if he was acting strangely, she was not about to become another notch on his bed post!

"Do you really want me to answer that?" retorted Marius dangerously, glaring at Crystal with barely concealed fury before turning and walking away, turning back one last time to exclaim, "Just don't cause any more shame to the Maycomb family name through your folly.", before continuing on his course, to where ever he was intending to go. Violet and Abigail both shot Crystal last looks of anger and exasperation, before sweeping after Marius out of the hallway.

Alone in the corridor, in a heap, backed into a wall, with her cheek swelling more with every passing second, Crystal was furious, but also confused. Both Abigail and Violet had actually shown some concern for her welfare, and she could not seem to figure out why, was it possible that they cared for her as a sister, at least a bit?

Confused and in pain, though determined to carry on regardless, Crystal gingerly picked herself up off the floor, wincing slightly, as she put weight on an ankle, that she had apparently twisted as she fell, this day was not going well, and some how she was going to have to find a way to deal with her injuries, without magic...

XXX

Sirius meanwhile, found himself being dragged into a side room by his mother, once there he saw his father and Regulus already seated in the small parlour, and taking a seat himself, he wondered what the hell was going on.

Sirius did not have to wait long to find out, apparently, his domineering, ambitious mother had brought them here, to discuss how they should be behaving at the party. She was pleased that Regulus was ingratiating himself with Abigail, and the powerful Maycomb family, but she had no idea what to do with Sirius. She said that he too needed to find a suitable pure blood wife, he was after all, the older son, and finding a match for him would have to be the priority, as he was the heir, but him being, a 'Gryffindor' did not make things particularly easy for her, as no self respecting pure blood would want their daughter to marry a 'Gryffindor', even if he was a Black.

Unfortunately for Sirius, he also discovered that she had noticed him with Crystal last night, and did not like the idea of him associating with someone like Crystal, who's own family did not even trust her, the girl may have been a Maycomb she said, but she was not to be trusted.

Sirius soon found himself being punished, for what his father termed, a 'lapse in judgement', and subjected to a short bout of the Crutacius Curse, to 'bring him back to his senses'.

Sirius left the small side parlour some time later, limping slightly, Regulus' smirk as he was being tortured still burned into his consciousness, "Shouldn't brothers be close and look out for each other?" he wondered ironically, thinking of ways that he and the Marauders could prank the Slytherins as payback for this last humiliation, though of course he had no intention of telling the Marauders why he wanted to prank them, he knew that they would only over react ands make it worse, and that he would suffer for anything that they did at his parents' hands' later, no matter how good their intentions were. Moony and Prongs could be far too over protective sometimes and he knew that they would react badly if he told them.

Whilst under the curse, Sirius had been forcibly reminded why he had so much wanted to stay at Hogwarts for Christmas, even if he would get to see more of Crystal the way things were now, he doubted that the time they spent together, was enough to make the punishments they each faced worth it, though, once he had thought this, he remembered, how it had felt to hold Crystal in his arms, and couldn't help smiling to himself, despite the residual pain, "No," he thought to himself dreamily, "a single second in Crystal's company is worth any amount of pain... WAIT!" he snapped internally breaking his dreamlike state, "Where the fuck did that come from?!", though he knew exactly where that had come from, his heart.

XXX

In pain Crystal had limped carefully to the library, a place she knew that none of the family were likely to trek to during the Christmas holidays, her favourite sanctuary, a place that she had used to think, held all of the answers to all of life's problems, if you could just find them...

She had learned a long time ago that even libraries did not contain the knowledge of how to deal with, and fix every problem, but it still brought her some comfort to see a place in the world where order existed and chaos did not reign. The rows of neat ordered books gave her strength and comfort, and on a more practical note, the many rows of books offered dozens of, relatively, safe hiding places, which, when she was a child she had often used to her advantage in the library of her own home, Maycomb Manor...

However now was not the time to get distracted by memories, she had a purpose in visiting the library, she was hoping that she might be able to find a book of healing potions that she might be able to brew for her injuries, despite having no where to brew such a potion, and no ingredients, she would have to cross that particular bridge if she came to it. She began to search through the huge collection, though she was having no luck, as most books in the Malfoy library seemed to be more concerned with causing people injuries, than healing them. She was so engrossed in her search that she didn't even notice Sirius coming up behind her...

XXX

Sirius had decided as soon as he left the parlour with his parents in, that he was going to have to find somewhere unusual to hide, somewhere, where no-one would ever think to look for him. The answer to his problems had come to him like a bolt out of the blue, he could hide in the library, after all, who would ever think to look for Sirius Black, troublemaker extraordinaire in a library! It was the perfect hiding place!

However when he had arrived there Sirius had soon discovered that he was not alone in thinking the library to be a good hiding place, as Crystal seemed to have had the same idea, he smiled thinking about the first time that he had seen her, holding that huge, ancient looking tome at breakfast when he had asked Sienna out months ago, and what Moony had told him about meeting Crystal often in the library at Hogwarts , "She obviously has a thing for libraries!" he thought, trying desperately to stifle an extremely undignified giggle. Though at the same time he could not help letting his mind drift, and wondering, if he had seen Crystal before Sienna how differently things would have turned out, of course, he knew now that she would have said no to him asking her out without a second thought, but still, he couldn't help but wonder...

As Sirius silently approached her however, he noticed something wrong. Although Crystal's face was turned slightly away from him, as she hadn't noticed him yet, he could still see, that across her left cheek there was the beginnings of a nasty looking, dark purple bruise where someone, most likely Marius, had clearly hit her.

His blood boiling with fury, that anyone would dare to do something that violent to a creature like Crystal, Sirius reached out, and without thinking, grabbed her arm, and pulled her sharply towards him. Grabbing both of her arms and forcing her to look him straight in the eye Sirius demanded to know who had done this to her, though he knew perfectly well who it was, he was going to kill Marius for this!

Crystal froze in his arms at the expression on his face, she looked like a deer trapped in the head lights, her ocean blue eyes wide with fear at Sirius' outburst, this was like last time, only worse, because now that Sirius knew her better, this was personal, and he was not about to let Marius get away with this.

"It was him again, wasn't it?" said Sirius, his voice shaking with fury, his strong hands digging in tightly to her arms as he waited for an answer that he knew she would never give.

XXX

Shocked, Crystal looked determinedly anywhere but at Sirius, trying desperately to ignore the stabbing pains in her arms where he was still holding her in his vice-like grip.

However, it seemed to Sirius, that apparently her silence was enough of an admission, and dropping his hands from her arms, he ran a hand angrily through his sleek black hair, and exclaimed passionately "I'll bloody swing for that bastard!"

At this extreme exclamation, Crystal seemed to regain control of her faculties, and, as he tried to storm out of the library, she ran after him, beating him to the doors, and standing in his way, effectively preventing him from leaving. She was furious with him, he was acting like she was his property, something weak he owned that needed his protection, and what exactly was he going to do to Marius anyway? Out numbered four to one he was not going to be able to do anything, he was only going to succeed in making life worse for both of them through his rash actions, she, therefore, had to stop him!

"And what exactly are you planning on doing?" Crystal spat angrily, "showing him the error of his ways, he won't listen Sirius!" , she tried to reason desperately.

"No, actually I was thinking more about socking him one, and then seeing how it goes from there." stated Sirius cockily, trying to mask his anger with confidence.

"Exactly what good do you think that will do Sirius?" screeched Crystal, exasperated and angry.

"Well, it'll make me feel better!" retorted Sirius furiously.

"And I suppose all that matters is how you feel?" questioned Crystal dangerously, her ocean blue eyes now glittering with fury as she surveyed the still fuming Sirius.

"No, of course not!", answered Sirius testily, running a hand through his silky black hair in exasperation, "I'm doing this for you..."

"Hah!" interrupted Crystal with a derisive laugh, "you are doing this to satisfy your own ego and you know it, so don't you dare try and use me as a fucking excuse you git!" said Crystal angrily, having to strongly curb her urge to slap him and wipe that self righteous look off his face.

Taking a deep breath Crystal began again, using Sirius' stunned silence as an opening, "Don't you see Sirius, if you attack Marius for me now, who do you think Marius will blame for it? And who do you think he'll take it out on later?" she explained carefully, before answering her own questions to hammer the points home, "Me! So you can't just storm off and confront him, because you might be protecting me now, but in the long term you will only put me and yourself in more danger, how do you honestly think that your parents would react to you beating up Marius?" she asked him, pleadingly looking into his stormy grey eyes, she knew she had won, his anger was evaporating, being replaced by realisation of the consequences of what he could easily have done.

"Easy," Sirius answered her calmly, "They'd beat the shit out of me, like they always do when I get into duels with Slytherins, only this time I'd be right to hand when they were most angry, since I'm not at Hogwarts, so it'd be ten times worse..." He trailed off, looking her in the eye, finally understanding what she had been trying to tell him.

"Do you get it now Sirius?", Crystal finished quietly, "You can't be my knight in shining armour, even if I wanted you to be, the price for both of us would be far too high, and you'd only make things worse. Don't you see, I could take revenge on Marius if I wanted, I'm skilled enough in a duel, but I'd end up paying for it later, because in the end I'm always out numbered, and for now at least I need them more than they need me." She finished quietly, begging him to understand, and praying not to break down in front of him again.

"I'm sorry," began Sirius quietly, his anger gone, as he, carefully, cupped Crystal's face with his hand, "I didn't think, I just wanted to protect you..."

"The thing is Sirius you never think, but it's not going to be you who has to deal with the consequences if you actually do do something stupid, you have friends at Hogwarts who can protect you, but I don't..." she said honestly, and then interrupting him before he could say what she knew he would, "and don't say that you'll protect me, even if I wanted you to, you couldn't possibly protect me 24 hours a day, and they're Slytherins, they're crafty, they'd get me eventually..." she finished dejectedly, a tear sliding down her cheek, as she lost control of her emotions for a second.

Sirius upon seeing this reacted instantly, tenderly wiping away the tear with his thumb, and kissing the spot where it had been, before leaning in to capture her mouth in a searing kiss, which Crystal, despite her better judgement, could not help but respond to...

Thanks for all the great reviews! Please continue to review, and tell me what you think, good or bad! Thanks! XXXXXXX


	10. The Kiss

**Someone To Understand**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot and any OCs.**

Sirius could not believe that he was kissing Crystal! When he had seen that tear slide down her, already bruised cheek, he could not stop himself from wiping it away, and trying to kiss away any more tears, and then he had been so close to her, and she wasn't pulling away, that he just had to kiss her, show her how much he cared for her, and when she had started to kiss him back with the same searing passion, he could not quite believe what was happening.

To Sirius, kissing Crystal was like touching heaven, it was hot, intense, and passionate, everything he had always known that kiss should be, though it had never been before. It was everything that he had ever thought it would be, and it set his heart beating a thousand miles an hour, it lasted only a second longer, but it left Sirius feeling more alive than he had ever felt in his life, it had been perfect, yet part of him knew that he should not have done it.

"Sorry about that," said Sirius honestly, looking into Crystal's intense blue eyes, still stroking her cheek, "I shouldn't have kissed you, not that I regret it exactly..." he fumbled searching for the right words, "I just know that I shouldn't have done it..." he finished lamely, reluctantly lowering his hand from her cheek.

"No, its alright" said Crystal sincerely, taking a step back from him, holding herself awkwardly, "It wasn't just your fault, I kissed you back, and I shouldn't have done, but you know that, for both our sakes, this can't ever be anything...", she trailed off, determinedly not looking Sirius in the eye.

"Yeah, I know." Sirius answered, looking at the floor, and trying to keep the disappointment out of his voice, he knew that she was right, if their families' found out about this, it would certainly not be pretty, but still, he wanted more kisses like that one, he wanted to talk to her, without fear of being watched, he just wanted her, no matter how much it cost...

Snapping himself out of his depressing day dreams Sirius looked up to see Crystal still standing awkwardly, her arms wrapped around herself to keep herself warm, looking at him with concern apparent on her face, her cheek was swelling badly, and suddenly Sirius remembered what their earlier argument had been about.

"Can't you heal that?" Sirius asked delicately, pointing at the dark purple bruise blooming across Crystal's cheek.

To his surprise, she sighed exasperatedly, and ran her fingers over the huge bruise, wincing at the pain it caused, "That's actually why I came to the library in the first place," she explained irritably, "I was hoping to find a potion or something to heal it, since I can't do magic outside of school."

Feeling guilty for interrupting her from her search, Sirius sighed and asked quietly, "Can I help?". To his immense surprise, at this request Crystal began to laugh, "What's so funny?" asked an extremely puzzled Sirius, waiting for Crystal to get a hold of herself, and tell him. "Well nothing really," answered Crystal seriously, attempting, and failing, to stifle more laughter, "But I should have considered earlier the fact that I'm not going to find anything here." She finished waving her hand at the numerous rows of books in the grand old library, before catching Sirius' blank expression, and explaining, "The Malfoys are more interested in causing injuries than healing them, half of these books are full of dark arts potions and curses, highly illegal most of it!" she laughed again, her blue eyes sparkling with amusement, despite the pain she must have been in.

Sirius was shocked, this girl had one dark sense of humour! But catching on to the humour in the situation himself, he too started laughing, glad to have something to break the tension, which seemed to have sprung up between them since the kiss.

However, for Sirius at least, laughter appeared to have been a bad idea, as it caused his muscles, already aching from where his father had used the Crutacius on him, to spasm in pain, and he could not prevent a grimace of pain from escaping his lips...

XXX

"Looks like I'm not the only one in pain here" thought Crystal sardonically, as she saw Sirius try to prevent himself from crying out in agony, caused by the effect his laughter had had on his already tender muscles. She recognised the after effects, muscle spasms, of the Crutacius immediately, having felt it often enough herself, and even occasionally seen it used on her siblings, since she was a child, and immediately rushed to his side to try and help him into a chair, trying, and failing, not to damage his male ego too badly at being helped by a girl.

Crystal felt bad for Sirius, what ever argument he had had with his parents, was likely to have been caused by her, and she couldn't help but feel responsible, he seemed to be in so much pain.

Crystal knew that the only thing that she could do for Sirius was to get the vial of muscle calming potion from her trunk, which she had made at Hogwarts, in preparation for the inevitable punishments from her parents in the holidays, however, she could not afford to be seen by a member of the family injured, it would show her as weak, so she couldn't go to her room, so what was she going to do?

The solution came to her instantly, house elves! She remembered Gilly the house elf who had showed her her room, had said to call if she needed anything, she was, after all, a member of the family, and, even if she had no power within the family, she could tell a house elf what to do!

Pleased with her own brilliance, but angry at not thinking of it earlier, Crystal called out Gilly's name, and tried not to jump as the small bug eyed creature, wearing a tea cosy suddenly materialised in front of her with a 'POP', before bowing and asking 'what she could do for little Mistress'.

Crystal hurriedly explained to the creature, that she needed her to bring a vial of pink liquid from the trunk in her room, and also, if she could, remembering her own injury, find a balm or potion in the house that could heal bruises. With a sudden squeak of, "Tis Gilly's pleasure little Mistress" the house elf disappeared with another 'POP', to begin its task.

Remembering her charge, Crystal turned to see a still grimacing Sirius, staring, with amusement, at the spot where the house elf had disappeared before saying quietly, "I hate house elves!" and leaning back into the chair tiredly.

"What do you mean you hate house elves?", asked Crystal incredulously, "I mean, sure they can be a little overly perky sometimes but they're sweet!" declared Crystal, scandalised at the thought that Sirius disliked such innocent creatures, that put up so graciously with being enslaved, and often tortured by, wizards, "Besides that one is going to help us!" she finished logically.

"I suppose you're right." Began Sirius testily, "But I defy even you to find Kreacher cute."

"Keacher?" questioned Crystal curiously.

"Yeah, Kreacher," said Sirius, looking extremely irritated and raking a hand through his hair, which Crystal noticed he always seemed to do when he was anxious, "He's my family's house elf, and one creepy little rodent, I'm telling you..."

"Oh, OK." Said Crystal, it made sense to her that Sirius would not be overly fond of anything that reminded him of a home he hated, it didn't make him right, but it did make him human, and she could see where he was coming from it.

Before the uncomfortable silence stretched on any longer, Gilly the house elf returned with a 'POP' bringing with her a vial of pink calming potion, and a pot of green bruise healing balm, which she presented to Crystal before vanishing again with a 'POP'.

"I told you she'd help us!" exclaimed Crystal triumphantly showing Sirius the two objects.

"Great," exclaimed Sirius sarcastically, "but what exactly did she bring us?"

"OH!" exclaimed Crystal, laughing nervously, "I forget to tell you! This," she said pointing at the pink vial of potion, "is a muscle calming potion, its for you, and should stop the muscle spasms caused by the Crutacius Curse," upon seeing his surprised expression she explained further, "yes I know what's wrong with you," muttering quietly under her breath, "been there done that." Before continuing with her explanation of the other object, "And this I hope, is a bruise healing balm." She said, handing him the vial and indicating for him to drink it, before, opening the foul smelling balm pot and applying the balm liberally to her horribly bruised cheek and, her, still swollen, ankle.

The effect of the balm was instantaneous, and, on the bruise on Crystal's cheek, there was a brief tingling sensation before it began to feel as though her cheek was deflating, and before she knew it the bruise was completely gone, leaving only flawless pale skin, the same, fortunately, occurred simultaneously with her ankle.

Smiling Crystal then looked towards Sirius, who still had not touched the potion, and was looking at it suspiciously, as though it might poison him, if he drank it.

Trying not to laugh at his suspicious expression, Crystal explained that she had brewed the potion herself at school, so there was really no chance that it was going to poison him, unless of course he didn't trust her. At this statement Sirius grinned at her sheepishly, before pulling the stopper out of the vial, and downing its contents, in one fluid movement.

Crystal was pleased to note, that after only a few seconds, Sirius' pain seemed to materially lessen, until within five minutes he seemed completely healthy again. Thanking her shyly, Sirius then squeezed her hand swiftly, and started to leave the room, reading Crystal's mood, and realising that she, most likely, wanted her sanctuary back so that she could think.

XXX

As soon as he had left the library the wheels in Sirius' head began to turn at a furious pace, as he wandered aimlessly through the house, eventually finding himself in the grounds, wearing only thin dress robes, in the frosty December morning, not that he noticed the cold. He spent all day in the grounds, allowing his thoughts to sweep him away, not even noticing when he missed lunch.

He had a lot to think about. He had actually kissed Crystal, something he had wanted to do since the first day he had ever seen her, though he knew that he shouldn't have done it, their lives were definitely complicated enough without having a dangerous relationship, which would need to be kept secret from even their closest friends.

He was happy that Crystal had been so concerned when he had been in pain, and that she had been caring enough to help him, even getting him a potion to ease the symptoms, though he could not help but feel ashamed that he had shown weakness in front of her, apparently old habits died hard, and he did not like the idea of appearing weak to her.

He had also discovered that Crystal's parents, like his own, often used the Crutacius on her as a form of discipline, something which he had suspected before, but not been able to confirm until she had recognised his symptoms. He was so angry with them and Marius, how could they treat Crystal that way? But what made it even more frustrating was the fact that he could do nothing about it, knowing that if he did all he would do, is make matters worse.

Sirius was so frustrated with his life, with the rules he was forced to abide by, no matter how distasteful he found them. He hated being a Black, and as always his jealousy of James' seemingly perfect home life was there. He didn't understand why he was condemned to such a miserable existence, like Crystal, whilst people like James seemed to be always happy, always getting what they wanted, not that he wanted to deny James this, he just wished that his own life were different, so that for once, he could actually do things the way that he wanted to, and have the life of love and security that he so longed for, instead of the life of cold ritual and formality that he had. He laughed when he realised that there were some people at Hogwarts, who wanted to be like him, popular, and have his life, he laughed at the thought, if they actually wanted to be like him then they were fools! He was utterly trapped!

To his anger, just after lunch, Sirius found his thoughts interrupted by Marius, the last person he particularly wanted to see, and a guy who he would have loved to kill, for what he had done to Crystal.

For once Marius was alone, an easy target, but Sirius surprised himself by keeping his cool, as Marius began, once again, to warn him off his little sister, Sirius just tuned him out, knowing that if he listened, he was likely to do something drastic, and fearing, if he did, the repercussions of his actions, so he simply made a few obligatory nasty remarks, and left the older boy as fast as possible, before he lost control and punched him.

XXX

Crystal was surprised when Sirius had seemed to read her so well and had left her to her thoughts in the library, though she was grateful to have some time to gather her thoughts.

She knew logically that she shouldn't have responded to his kiss earlier, but it was difficult for her not to, it just felt so right, it was like fire works, how she had heard a kiss should be, but had never felt before.

Crystal knew that she should not trust Sirius, but earlier he had been so upset when he had seen her in pain, he had wanted to protect her, and as patronising as that had been, she was flattered by his concern for her welfare, though logically she knew that had he done anything it would have only made her life more difficult. She was also upset to find that where his parents were concerned, they were about as caring towards him as her's were towards her, and, though she had guessed this already, surprisingly, the thought made her angry, after all, she reasoned, no one deserved to be treated like that, so all she was feeling was friendly concern, wasn't she?

Crystal however, unlike Sirius did put in appearance at lunch, fearing the consequences if she didn't, and quickly noticing Sirius absence, she couldn't help but wonder where he was, and if he had had another run in with his parents or Marius.

XXX

For the rest of the holiday Crystal and Sirius danced around each other, often talking to each other in the library, catching each other's eyes at dinner, and talking when they thought that non-one was watching them, it was difficult, and in the two week Christmas holiday both suffered a great deal, both physically, and mentally at the hands of their families, but, unlike before when neither had anyone to talk to, or understand, they now each had someone to turn to, to hold them, to listen to them as they poured their heart's out, and to heal their wounds when necessary.

Christmas and New Year had come and gone, in a swirl of parties and meaningless formalities, Crystal and Sirius had secretly exchanged gifts, during a midnight session in the library, and now, thanks to Crystal's gift, they could communicate with each other secretly, using quills which were keyed to write in ink only visible to a person that the author programmed them to, whilst allowing anyone else to see only a boring letter of no importance, whilst Sirius gave Crystal a bracelet, which he explained, was keyed to the Black family crest medallion, which his parents forced him to wear, and which would automatically alert him should her life ever be in danger. Crystal was pleased with his gift, though she couldn't help but think that he was more likely to get himself into a life-threatening situation, than she was, and even if she ever found herself in one, perhaps he would not be the best person to have around, however, she did appreciate the gesture, even if she didn't entirely agree with his assessment of the situation, as, she could, after all, take care of herself.

To Crystal's relief Sirius no longer exploded with anger every time he saw her hurt, he was still angry, but he dealt with it by helping and comforting her, instead of trying to seek foolhardy revenge on Marius or her parents, which he now realised would only make the situation worse. Each of them longed to help the other but both now realised that it was up to the other to save themselves, and all they could really do for each other was, offer comfort, and wait for the time when they came of age and would be free from their families' forever. They had settled into a pattern of helping each other, and understanding, but doing nothing that could be used as proof linking them together, a pattern that they each now, secretly, hoped to continue at Hogwarts.

**Thank you to Vanessa-Black and Wood for your lovely review (and thanks for all the reviews I've got for previous chapters, they really encourage me!) and thanks to everyone who put me on author alert, I'm sooo honoured!**

**And to everyone else reading, please review, good or bad I want to know what you think! **

**Thanks! XXXXXXX**


	11. Back To Hogwarts

Someone To Understand

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot and any OCs.**

**Well le manchot du destin, here you go, presenting the "new Sirius" and the Marauders reactions to him, enjoy!**

The day finally came, when to both Sirius and Crystal's immense relief, it was time to return to Hogwarts. The hellish Christmas holiday was finally over, and it was time to return to the friends, that they had both been prevented, by their families from writing to during the duration of the holiday, the world where Sirius and Crystal had seemed to exist alone together had shattered, and it was finally time to return to reality, the question was, would Crystal and Sirius stay as 'almost' friends at Hogwarts, or would they return to being enemies?

XXX

From the moment that the James and the other Marauders met Sirius on the Hogwarts express, he knew that something was wrong, Padfoot was being far too quiet, not to mention distant.

James knew that normally when Sirius was forced home for the holidays, and not allowed to write to his friends, he usually came back louder and more exuberant than before, though whether it was to make up for lost time, or mask what he was feeling James was not sure, what he did know however, was that this new, pensive Sirius was not one who's company he particularly enjoyed, he needed to find out what was wrong with his friend, and fast!

James observed Sirius carefully during the journey, watching as he made half hearted attempts at conversation with the other Marauders, his eyes constantly flickering towards the door, as if he was expecting someone to walk through it, though who this could be James desperately wanted to know. He did not talk at all of the holidays, though this was by no means unusual, the other Marauders had learnt a long time ago, that Sirius did not like to talk about, or think about his home life, and they respected his wishes about the matter, though often they wished that he felt secure enough to tell them what was so horrible at home.

James could not think what could have possibly caused a change this big in his friend, and, from Moony's worried glances at Sirius, he could tell that he was not the only one who was concerned about him. However, all thoughts of Sirius were soon wiped from his mind, when none other than the luscious Lily Evans and her friends, Rose Parker, Maya Goldberg and Louise Wilkes, walked into the compartment, apparently coming in to talk to him and his friends. Smiling at his good luck, James Potter walked over to welcome them, a hand flying nervously to ruffle his already very messy hair.

XXX

Sirius had been sitting, trying to prevent himself from becoming lost in his thoughts again, and thus getting the Marauders even more concerned than they already were about him, as he knew that James and Remus, already knew that something was up with him, when in walked four girls that, he would, normally, have been happy to see, if, for once in his life, he hadn't wanted to just be on his own with his thoughts.

Strangely Sirius found himself wishing that he was still at Malfoy Manor with Crystal, she would easily have been able to read his mood, and would gladly have left him to himself for a while, allowing him time to sort out his jumbled thoughts, she always seemed to know just what he was thinking, she understood him, explanations were never necessary, she just knew. He found himself, already, missing Crystal dreadfully, and he could not help the thought "Why isn't she here?" from bouncing around his head, though he knew logically, that they could not be seen together.

Sirius was so busy going off at a tangent in his thoughts, that he did not even acknowledge the presence of the four new arrivals, say hello, or really enquire about their holidays, even when he had managed to snap himself, somewhat, out of his earlier dreamlike state. Lily, Louise and Maya were unfazed by this turn of events, obviously realising that he had something on his mind, Rose however was a different matter altogether.

XXX

Rose Parker was livid, it had taken her the better part of three quarters of an hour to convince Lily and Maya to visit the Marauders, Louise did not count, as she had not taken any convincing at all, not that Rose had wanted her to come, and now that she was here, finally with Sirius for the first time in two weeks, he was completely ignoring her!

What exactly had happened in the last two weeks that had so effectively captured Sirius' attention? At least Rose could comfort herself that he could not possibly be thinking about that Ravenclaw bitch Crystal Maycomb, after all, he could not have spent all holiday thinking about her, and there was no way he could have seen her outside of school, was there?

Rose spent the rest of the train ride, trying, unsuccessfully to capture Sirius' attention, trying desperately to prove to herself, that she was still in with a chance of winning his heart, with little success in the endeavour.

XXX

Crystal also found herself somewhat distracted on the train ride to Hogwarts, she could not stop wondering what Sirius was doing, and had to forcibly stop herself from fazing out in the middle of her conversation with Sienna. Fortunately Sienna did not really seem to notice, and when, when Mandy Corner and Patricia Boot entered the compartment, she began gossiping with them, it was much more easy for Crystal to drift off into her thoughts unnoticed, as she never usually joined in with their conversations anyway, finding them far too boy-centric to be interesting, so nobody was suspicious that she said nothing.

XXX

At the welcome feast that evening, Sirius could not stop himself from looking over to the Ravenclaw table every few minutes, and watching Crystal talking, and laughing with Sienna, and when she finally looked up, and locked eyes with him, giving him a small warm smile, he could not prevent a goofy grin sliding across his face in reply.

The other Marauders of course, immediately noticed Sirius's strange behaviour, and James soon began demanding to know, why Sirius was grinning like a Cheshire Cat. Sirius, not having answer for this, decided that his friends deserved to know at least some of the truth about his holiday, and explained to them quickly, in hushed whispers about the family get together, and how he had been forced into spending time with Crystal, obviously omitting all details pertaining to Sirius' and Crystal's treatment by their families, but leaving in the fact that he and Crystal were now friends.

The Marauders were shocked, to say the least at Sirius' revelations, having previously believed that Crystal hated him, as well as the fact that Sirius Black could never just be friends with a girl, however, for the most part, they took the news well, realising that it did somewhat explain Sirius weird behaviour, if somehow, this strange girl, had managed to get under his skin.

XXX

However the Marauders were not the only ones to notice Sirius' bizarre exchange with Crystal at the Ravenclaw table, Rose Parker had also been watching the whole display with disbelief. "Why on earth" thought Rose sensibly, "would Sirius be watching her? And why would he react so violently to a simple smile from her?" she wondered inwardly, desperately wanting to voice her thoughts to her friends, but deciding to wait until later, in a more private environment to do it.

Rose could not believe that Sirius was still thinking about Crystal, sure, he got crushes all the time, but they never lasted this long, and Sirius never lost control, the way he had done just then, when Crystal had smiled at him. Rose was worried, very worried, Crystal was serious competition, and Rose had underestimated her once, it was not going to happen again...

XXX

Over on the Ravenclaw table, Crystal had to physically restrain herself from laughing at the goofy smile on Sirius' face, the situation forcibly reminding her of the day she had first really met him, when Sienna had had a similar reaction to one of his smiles, it was quite ironic really that Sirius was finding himself in the same situation that he usually caused in girls, not to mention terribly funny.

Trying to compose her features, Crystal turned back to her conversation with Sienna about Christmas, though her mind was elsewhere, it was over at the Gryffindor table with Sirius...

XXX

School started up again, the same as always, with lessons Quidditch practices, detentions and pranks on Slytherins for Sirius. He tried to be as he had previously been, and to some extent, he succeeded, though he quickly fell back into his bad old habit of watching Crystal at meal times, though now at least, she would look back, and share smiles with him, however they rarely talked, it just wasn't safe to do so, and this saddened Sirius greatly, as he found himself horribly missing her company, as a friend, but also as something more...

At night Sirius' mind would drift back to the holiday, and the way it had felt, to hold Crystal in his arms, to wake up next to her, to kiss her, he wanted so much to feel that again, it was the best feeling in the world, and, worse still, one that he wasn't sure he would ever get to feel again. He wished desperately that things weren't so complicated for him and Crystal, and that they could just be together, but it wasn't possible, so he would just have to comfort himself with the ghost of her touch.

XXX

Unbeknownst to Sirius, Crystal felt the same, she missed him terribly, dreaming of him at night, longing for him by day, and trying desperately to hide the fact from everyone around her. Marius would kill her if he knew what she felt for Sirius, her parents would disown her and she could not tell Sienna, a girl that Sirius had so publicly used and dumped, she was also still not entirely sure that she could trust Sirius, he was, after all, a player, someone not to be trusted, was he really worth all of this trouble? She spent more and more time pondering what to do but could still come to no conclusions.

XXX

Several weeks after they had arrived back at school, Sirius was walking during the lunch hour, about the grounds with the Marauders and several girls from their year, Maya, Lily, Louise and Rose, discussing that morning's prank on the Slytherins, when he saw a most alarming scene taking place, only a relatively short distance in front of him.

It was Crystal, and she seemed to be involved in a losing battle with several Slytherins, Marius, Violet, Abigail, Regulus, Snape and, Lucilla Parkinson. She had already been knocked to the ground, and Sirius could hear her calling out in pain from where he was standing.

In that moment Sirius' blood boiled, and he took off at a run towards Crystal and the people attacking her, the other Marauders following closely at his heels. Shooting off several successive spells, his friends doing the same, between them the Marauders managed to disarm and incapacitate all of the Slytherins.

Angry at being interrupted and so easily disarmed by the Marauders, Marius was in a vicious mood, "What the hell do you think you're doing interrupting a family matter?" he demanded brusquely, glaring at Sirius with his cold blue eyes, which also flickered every few seconds to glare at Remus, the person who had disarmed him, and who was presently holding his wand.

"Well," began Sirius angrily, "when I see someone being beaten up, and out numbered, by a group of thugs which include members of their own family I tend to get upset!" hissed Sirius sarcastically, surveying the whole group with extreme distaste.

"Funny that you don't seem to share this concern when you're part of the group of thugs doing the beating up!" hissed Snape nastily, from where he was lying, motionless under James' wand, whilst James himself also gripped Snape's own wand in his other hand, having disarmed him earlier.

"Shut up Snivellus!" hissed James furiously, "This is a completely different situation." he stated confidently, though Sirius could not help but secretly admit that Snape might just have a point.

"Come on guys, let's go," began Violet cautiously, picking herself up off the ground, as the 'impedimentia' spell she had been put under wore off, "they're not worth the trouble!", she finished angrily, helping Lucilla, Regulus and her sister up off the ground and watching as James and Remus handed Snape and Marius their wands back, before shooting Crystal one last filthy look and leaving with the rest of her group.

"We'll be watching you Black!" snapped Marius furiously, as he turned to leave with his friends, shooting his sister a disgusted look as Lily helped her to her feet, and saying to her "If you insist on spending all your time with blood traitors and mudbloods," he said looking pointedly at Lily and the Marauders, "then we'll be forced to treat you like one! Take care little sister!" he finished menacingly, before striding boldly away.

XXX

Crystal was momentarily still and silent after her brother left, her face was pale, there was a gash across one cheek, and she was clearly still in shock from the attack, but she herself shocked everyone by snapping out of it, and turning to Lily and the Marauders and apologising, "I'm sorry," she began quietly, "Marius had no right to call you those things," then turning to Lily she continued comfortingly, ignoring the stunned looks of those around her, who could not believe that she was comforting someone else after what had just happened to her, "I hope you don't tar us all with the same brush just because he is a bigoted idiot, not all pure bloods are like that."

"It's alright," stated Lily reasonably, "you didn't call me a mudblood, and you can't control your brother's actions. I also wouldn't tar you with the same brush as him because he clearly wouldn't have attacked you if you shared the same views." She explained, gazing at Crystal with sympathy, though fortunately not pity, "But why did he attack you?" asked Lily quietly, staring intently at Crystal.

"That's what I'd like to know." interrupted James, staring at Crystal with a curious mix of pity and exasperation.

"You wouldn't understand." Stated Crystal simply, she knew they wouldn't get it and she was not going to waste her time trying to explain it to them, their lives were simply worlds apart, they couldn't possibly ever know what it was like for her, she was more concerned with how Sirius was taking this, and chancing a look at him, she saw him staring at her, clearly not listening to the conversation, an inscrutable expression on his handsome face.

Seeming to snap out of his thoughts Sirius' looked into Crystal's eyes, his stormy grey eyes flickering dangerously with passion and anger, "Why didn't you tell me that it had started again?" he asked quietly, a dangerous edge to his would be calm voice, effectively silencing all other conversations between the Marauders and the girls.

Crystal sighed with irritation, ignoring the others and gazing solely at Sirius, she replied calmly, "And what would you have done if I had told you Sirius, rushed off and done something rash again like last time? There was nothing you could have done to stop it, so you didn't need to know.", at this comment Sirius sighed and ran his hands through his long black hair, realising that what she said was probably true, and determinedly not looking her in the eye, neither of them noticing the shocked expressions of the other people listening to this conversation. "I didn't want you to do anything stupid, the consequences would be too great for both of us if you did, and like I said before I don't need you to be my night in shining armour, I can take care of myself." She exclaimed gazing into his eyes fiercely.

"Because it really looked that way from where I was standing!" replied Sirius sarcastically, loosing his temper with this whole situation.

"Well I can hold my own in a duel" began Crystal angrily, "but when the odds are six to one fighting back isn't always such a great idea, as it tends to just make them angrier! Sometimes it is better to do nothing and just walk away Sirius, though I don't expect you to understand that!" she spat, turning to walk off in the direction of the school when Sirius unexpectedly grabbed her wrist and forced her back to look at him.

"You can't run from them forever Crystal." He said quietly, looking deeply into her blue eyes, and surprising her with the intensity of his gaze, and his words...

"I know." She answered him simply, "neither can you," she said, smiling sadly at him, and staring back at him with the same passionate intensity as him, "But I'm not ready to face them just yet." She said, her words laced with meaning that she knew only he would grasp, and her eyes filled with painful mixture of hope and despair. They stayed that way for several moments, locked in each other's eyes, speaking without words, simply silently understanding each other, and ignoring the presence of everyone else in the area.

After a few seconds longer Crystal wrenched herself away from Sirius' gaze, and loosening herself from his grip she began to walk away from him, before he called back to her and said simply, "What will you do the next time this happens?"

"Simple," she answered him smiling, "I'll survive." she said before taking another few steps to pick up her fallen wand and school bag, and muttering a well placed 'healaris', she promptly healed the gash on her cheek and strode determinedly off, leaving a stunned group of Marauders, and 6th year girls to ponder what the hell had just happened...

Please review, I would like to know what you think, constructive criticism is always welcome! Also as I'm away this weekend don't expect any updates till at least Sunday, sorry about that, but I do have a social life, even if you don't think so by the rate at which I update fan fiction!

**Thanks! XXXXXXXX**


	12. Explaining To Friends

**Someone To Understand**

It took a moment for the stunned silence that descended over the group, after Crystal's fast exit, after the Slytherin confrontation, to pass.

The three other Marauders and the four 6th year girls that they were with had absolutely no idea what had just happened, but they knew that they had missed something big from what they had gathered from Sirius and Crystal's bizarre conversation afterwards.

It appeared, to them, that Crystal was being routinely beaten up by her own siblings, and several other Sytherins, but they had absolutely no idea why it was happening. What could she have possibly done to warrant such treatment from her own family? It made absolutely no sense! And, what made even less sense was Sirius' reaction to the whole situation.

Sirius had been very angry to discover the scene that the group had encountered, but he did not seem surprised, merely angry that he hadn't known that 'it', the abuse presumably, had started again and she hadn't told him. But why on earth would Crystal Maycomb tell Sirius Black anything, and why would Sirius Black, the 'man whore' of Hogwarts suddenly begin to worry about an unknown Ravenclaw girl, who he had barely got on with in the past?

Crystal and Sirius were not friends, they were barely acquaintances, as far as any of them knew, and occasionally even enemies, so how did they suddenly know each other so well? Sure they had spent some time over the holidays together, but they couldn't have got so close so fast, and Crystal was talking to Sirius as if she knew things about him that even the Marauders didn't, which was surprising in itself, even if Sirius was 'cagey' when talking about his family. If what Crystal was implying was true then Sirius received the same treatment from these Slytherins, which included his own brother, as she did, but surely this could not be true, as they could **not** imagine the cocky, arrogant Sirius Black that they knew would never take abuse from Slytherins lying down, and he had never mentioned anything to any of them, so what the hell was going on, and what the hell had that bizarre conversation actually been about?

XXX

James was the first to break the silence, snapping out of his temporary stunned stupor to fix a harsh, hazel eyed, glare on Sirius, his still fuming best friend who was continuing to gaze avidly at Crystal's retreating form, before saying coldly to said supposed 'best friend', "What the hell was all that about Sirius?", dropping the affectionate nickname of 'Padfoot' and giving Sirius a clear indication of just how angry James was about being kept in the dark.

"What was all what about James?" asked Sirius wearily, running a hand agitatedly through his long elegant hair, he did not want to get into pure blood family politics with James and the others just yet, in fact he could safely say that it was the last thing in the world that he ever intended to do. After all, his friends came from a different world to him, they could never understand the world of back stabbing, family loyalty and secrets that he and Crystal were so desperately trying to forget they were from.

What on earth could Sirius possibly say to his friends to make them understand his life? The answer was simple, nothing, unless you experienced it you could never understand, and the last thing that he had ever wanted was their pity. Much as he loved the Marauders, Sirius realised that this situation could have nothing to do with them, if they became involved they could quite possibly get themselves killed, pure blood families did not like being dictated to or lectured, and if they involved the authorities things would only get that much worse for him and Crystal, as no self respecting pureblood family would ever be unable to bribe their way out of bad situation but would be sure to punish those responsible it.

All of this flashed through Sirius head in about a millisecond, fortunately, as it only took James that long to completely snap!

"Don't give me that shit Sirius!" screamed James furiously, taking a menacing step towards Sirius as he spoke, and giving him his patented evil eye. "I want the truth and I want it now!", taking a deep breath he finished his tirade calmly, "Now, what did she mean when she said that **you** would have to face them eventually, and why did they attack her in the first place?"

Most people knew that when James Potter looked at you with his 'evil eye' you did exactly what he said, no questions asked, he had a famous temper, and no one wanted to be on the wrong side of it, however most people were not Sirius Black.

Sirius had known that James would react exactly the way he did, and so was not in the least phased by this turn of events, after all Sirius was used to being threatened by, and verbally sparring with people far more intimidating than James Potter, he may have disliked being a Black, but that did not mean that he wasn't one, and in a pureblood family you had to be cunning to survive. Sirius had absolutely no intention of giving in to James, and no amount of threats were ever going to change that, there were some things that you just didn't talk about!

Summoning up all his inner strength, and silently cursing Crystal for having the foresight to leave before this game of '20 questions' began, Sirius rebuilt his temporarily dropped mental barriers. His years of practice kicked in, and his aristocratic nature took over, he shuttered the feeling from his eyes, stopped his hand from running through his hair and wiped his face of all emotion. Years doing exactly this at family gatherings and such ensured that his posture gave away nothing of the turbulence of his thoughts, he now radiated impassiveness and unconcern, and suddenly he did not seem to be Sirius Black , the boy that they all knew, suddenly he was a haughty, and arrogant young man, who's poise and impassiveness at such a traumatic situation was like nothing they had ever witnessed from Sirius before, successfully unnerving the captivated audience in front of him.

Keeping his features schooled and his voice cold and indifferent, Sirius answered James question in the same way that Crystal had done, telling him simply, "You wouldn't understand, so I'm not going to waste my time explaining it to you!", focusing his cold grey eyes on each of them in turn Sirius brought his point home with a stare, silently challenging anyone to ask another question.

XXX

James meanwhile was flabbergasted, his 'evil eye' had never failed to get him any information he wanted in the past, no one had ever been able to stand up to him like Sirius had just done, what did it mean? And how was it that his friend had suddenly transformed before his eyes into someone unrecognisable, what had happened to his, ever relaxed, best friend, and why was he being so defensive about this, what was so big that he couldn't tell his friends? Marauders always told each other everything, so why had Sirius told things to Crystal that he had not even told to his supposed 'best friends'!

Though he would not admit it, even to himself, James was hurt and quite jealous of Crystal's new found understanding of Sirius, as well as being obviously concerned for Sirius himself, and confused by the turn that events had once again taken. Just what was his best friend hiding? What could be so important, and so awful that he would not talk about it?

James was so stunned by Sirius' newly discovered implacable and unshakeable attitude that he had no idea how to continue this conversation in a way that would get him answers, threats hadn't worked, and they never usually failed with Sirius, except on family matters, so what exactly was he supposed to do now to get his friend Padfoot to talk?

XXX

Meanwhile, Lily may not have had a clue what Crystal's fight with the Slytherins was about, but she knew bullying when she saw it, and felt that it was her duty as a Prefect to report it, whatever else was happening at the moment.

So summoning all her Gryffindor courage, and taking advantage of the sudden lull in conversation between James and Sirius, she stepped forward, and tentatively touching Sirius' arm, to direct his tension towards her she began to speak to the group. "Well I don't know about the rest of you,", she began quietly, unusual for her as she was normally very outspoken, which showed just how much this situation had shaken her, " but I fully intend to report this incident to Professor McGonagall" she said her voice getting stronger as she spoke and noticed all the encouraging nods she was receiving, "its our duty to make sure that this never happens again."

Amongst the murmurings of approval however was heard a derisive snort, "So you really think that telling Mc Gonagall will make her life better?", exclaimed Sirius, his cold grey eyes dancing with mockery, "I never had you pegged as naive Lily." he commented condescendingly.

Lily was shocked, she could not understand what Sirius was thinking in not wanting to report this incident, and truth be told, this 'new' cold and controlled Sirius was starting to freak her out. His façade of indifference was unnerving, and so different from his usual natural exuberance, but as she watched him masking his emotions, and changing his personality to fit the situation she couldn't help but wonder if what she normally saw of his personality wasn't just as much of a façade as this cold and calculating one, and wonder then what his real personality was like…

Finally snapping out of her reverie Lily simply stated "It's the right thing to do." , as if that answered everything .

Sirius snorted in disdain, but looking Lily straight in the eye with nothing but honesty he quietly said, "If you report this you'll be signing her death warrant."

Lily gasped in alarm, looking towards her friends for answers, though they were as clueless as her about what Sirius meant, he surely could not be serious! Though looking into Sirius' eyes she was certain that he was not lying.

"I don't understand." Lily finally admitted looking to Sirius for an explanation.

"And you never will." Stated Sirius simply, looking at Lily with an inscrutable expression, it flickered for a second into something akin to envy, though later Lily was sure that she must have misread the look, after all why would Sirius Black, Hogwarts School 'heart throb' envy her?

"And you won't explain?" questioned Remus exasperatedly, he had clearly been trying to glean information by listening to the conversation but was probably growing impatient with Sirius's lack of helpfulness regarding the subject.

Sirius shook his head and once again racked a hand through his long shaggy hair, as he began to pace, his façade of indifference once again slipping, exactly how was he supposed to make them understand something that they would never themselves experience? But he knew that he had to tell them something a bit more convincing, or they were sure to report the incident to McGonagall, as, from there the incident would surely be passed on to the families of those involved, which was sure to be a disaster, for him as well as Crystal. Sirius did not like to even contemplate the beating he would get if his parents ever found out that he had interfered in 'Slytherin justice', from the school, it would be bad enough if Regulus told him, that would be a normal occurrence, but a report from the school would require 'special attention'. Sirius knew that he had to put a stop to this situation, now, before it got any further out of his control.

Therefore steeling his resolve Sirius stopped pacing and racking a hand through his hair, turning instead to look at the group of his 'friends', who through their unwitting involvement in this situation had suddenly changed in his mindset from being friends to being possible engineers of his and Crystal's destruction.

Putting on his most sincere expression Sirius tried to explain in a way that they might understand. He began by saying calmly, "If you tell McGonagall about this she will be compelled to talk to their parents, and then what do you think will happen?"

Seeing the blank looks of his friends and trying to put as much understanding back into his vice as he could manage, he continued, as though he were a teacher addressing small children, "Crystal's parents won't take her side, if they did this wouldn't be happening now, and if they find out that their other children got into trouble because of Crystal, she will suffer for it, even more so than she does now, therefore you will only make her life worse by 'helping'."

"But we can't just do nothing!", exclaimed Lily exasperatedly, her voice filled with suppressed rage and passion against an unfair system which clearly discriminated against the weak.

"That is exactly what you must do." Stated Sirius coldly, he knew that he **had** to make his friends understand before they did something stupid, so his voice held no warmth or understanding, only cold hard facts, the kind that his naive friends had yet to learn, and the kind with which he unfortunately was all to familiar with.

"But its not fair!" exclaimed Lily heatedly, seemingly the only person who was not too shocked by these revelations, and Sirius cold and suddenly calculating manner to comment.

"Such is life." Stated Sirius dejectedly flicking his long hair out of his eyes and sighing at the unfairness of it all, he suddenly felt much older than his immature friends, jaded and weary of life, for the first time showing to them his true nature, impassive, cold and frighteningly realistic and jaded, his eyes now showing that he had clearly seen more of the harshness of life than any person his age should have had to.

Then suddenly weary of this uncomfortable, and unwanted conversation, Sirius like Crystal. Quickly spun on his heel and left, heading back towards the castle to brood and avoid the inquiries of his so-called 'friends' he was in no mood for any further conversation.

XXX

Sirius friends for there part were shocked, what had happened to make Sirius their extrovert joker friend so world weary and jaded, what had they been missing for all these years that was so awful in his life, and why would he not explain things to them? Sirius suddenly seemed so much older than they were.

Reflecting on the strangeness of events, and trying to make some sense out of what they had heard the group moved towards Gryffindor tower talking quietly. Sirius had convinced them, against their better judgement not to go to McGonagall about the incident, but they still intended to find answers to their, as yet unanswered questions about Sirius and Crystal.

XXX

Crystal meanwhile had returned to Ravenclaw tower , after the confrontation, determined to carry on with her lunch time regime as normal, her façade firmly in place and all obvious injuries healed, Sienna was as usual oblivious to what had just occurred and chatted to Crystal animatedly about the latest school gossip, seemingly not noticing, or perhaps used to Crystal's muted responses.

The two girls went to afternoon lessons as normal but Crystal's mind was always far from what they were studying, it was analysing this most recent confrontation with Sirius. Arguments with him were becoming a regular occurrence, as were his annoying bouts of righteous indignation about failing to protect her, however despite the annoyance, Crystal could not help but be surprised about Sirius' sudden urge to protect her, had he developed feeling for her? She thought it extremely unlikely, he was after all still Sirius Black womaniser extraordinaire, but still she had no other explanation for his actions and the understanding which seemed to be flourishing between them, despite her better judgement.

However most importantly Crystal wondered what Sirius friends would do about the scene that they had stumbled across, would they tell a professor, thus making her life more difficult, or would Sirius get them to keep quiet? But most importantly she wondered, could she really trust Sirius…?

XXX

Sirius did eventually return to Gryffindor tower that day to get his bag for afternoon lessons, but he was strangely subdued with his friends, refusing too answer their questions, with his mind clearly somewhere-else he was obviously determined to put the incident behind him and not mention it again, though he was clearly still thinking about it, and Crystal…

**PS Sorry it has been soooo long since I updated, but what can I say, real life is a bitch and at the moment I am unfortunately swamped with work so I am afraid you can expect more irregular updates with big gaps between them (sadly life must take precedence sigh) but I do fully intend to finish the story (EVENTUALLY) so please just be patient with me! I'll try and update again soon, but no promises! **

**Thanks!**

**XXX**


	13. Slytherin Plotting and Black Eagle Owls

**Someone To Understand**

**Disclaimer: Sadly I own nothing except any OCs, so please don't sue!**

It had been three days since the incident with the Marauders and the Slytherins and fortunately no one had been killed…yet.

James and Sirius were probably on the worst terms of their lives, not that it was easy to tell. There seemed to be an unspoken agreement between the two not to mention what had happened. James was still trying to work through what he had seen, and Sirius… Sirius seemed to be in no particular hurry to tell anyone about what had really happened. He had already told them everything he intended to say on the subject, and that was that.

On the surface the Marauders were back to normal, but beneath it tensions were mounting. James may have been angry and hurt, but Remus and Peter were feeling ostracized which could not possibly be a good thing. They were back to their prank pulling best already but it was obvious to anyone who really knew them, not that many did, that their hearts weren't really in it.

It's hard to close your eyes again one the truth has been rammed so forcefully in your face, and apparently the truth was, that Sirius did not trust the rest of them enough to share his secret, whilst Remus was bearing his soul to them every full moon. It didn't seem fair to any of them, and it was clear that Remus resented it, though he said nothing, but Sirius could not be prevailed upon to talk, and the others didn't want to alienate themselves further by pushing the issue with him.

So no one did anything, they just hoped that things would somehow fix themselves… It's a shame that ignoring a problem doesn't make it go away…

XXX

Meanwhile the rest of the school may have been oblivious to the Marauders' change in dynamic, but Lily wasn't… The years of watching the Marauders, purely over suspicion of their pranks, had finally paid off. She could tell that something was still not quite right between them, it wasn't particularly noticeable, she was sure that no one else had picked up on the strange vibe they were emitting, but she recognised the signs. They were… subdued, that was the only word for it. Before they had been, what exactly? Something… so, flamboyant, excitable, fun, trusting…that was it.

The easy camaraderie that they had always seemed to share, whilst still there, it had clearly been badly dented by whatever had gone down with Sirius, Crystal and the Slytherins that day. Apparently Sirius still hadn't explained to them what that was all about and it was definitely taking its toll on their relationship. She had always been slightly jealous of that facet of the Marauders relationship (not that she would ever tell them that!) she couldn't trust her friends the way that the Marauders seemed to implicitly trust each other. Perhaps such strong friendships had to be formed through common adversity, or in this case common detentions…

She was almost sorry to see it breaking, almost; these were still the Marauders after all. But the loss of that friendship, that easy trust that the group had seemed to share since First Year, with the countless secrets they had shared to bind them together, was slightly disconcerting, it felt… like the end of childhood, and the beginning of darker things to come. She couldn't help but shiver at the thought.

If Sirius wouldn't share this secret, how many other secrets and lies existed in the group just waiting to tear them apart? Was this a sign of things to come? She sincerely hoped not, things were dark enough in their world with that psychotic, muggle hating Dark Lord Voldemort on the rise; they definitely did not need any more problems!

Still she couldn't help but watch the group pretending that everything was normal and had to strongly curb the urge to march over there and tell them to sort it out. She had an awful premonition that if they didn't sort things out then they'd only get worse. But hadn't she tried asking Sirius already? And look how well that had worked out! As if they'd listen to her anyway! But she couldn't stand watching James so miserable. He was James! He should be bouncing back with a cocky grin and a smart remark, why was he sitting there looking so miserable? It just wasn't right, and it hurt her heart more than a little to see it… Not that she would ever admit that to him.

Surprisingly it looked like out of the four boys that James was the worst actor, since he was the only one actually looking upset when she knew perfectly well that they all were. Quite a revelation since he was their self appointed leader, and, modesty aside he generally was the best in their group at most things. Sirius being a good actor she could understand, she'd realised recently that he had never been entirely what he seemed, being a pureblood with a rank equivalent to muggle aristocracy she should have realised years ago that his 'Jack the lad' image was just that, an image, a façade. (She blamed that particular lack of insight on her intense dislike of him, fostered by their disastrous very first meeting on the Hogwarts Express, during which he had somehow managed to turn her hair green, an experience which had been quite disconcerting for the then eleven year old muggle born girl.)

However Remus and Peter were another matter. She had never got the impression, that aside from being Marauders, and therefore both completely untrustworthy, (well maybe Remus not so much…) that either of them would have been a particularly good actor, but the evidence spoke for itself. They were both doing remarkably fine impressions of people who had nothing to worry about. She couldn't help but wonder where that skill came from, and subconsciously realise that she shouldn't have written off the Marauders so easily all those years ago. They may have been gits, but there was clearly more going on with them than met the eye. Perhaps they deserved a chance after all…

XXX

Crystal meanwhile was glad that no more was being said by the Gryffindors about the incident that they had walked in on. None of them had said anything to the teachers yet, which came as an immense relief to her, and which she was sure was probably solely because of Sirius' pleas on her behalf. She knew that his friends were giving him trouble about not explaining what was going on with him, but she was genuinely grateful that he had yet to spill anything to any of them. She had enough problems to deal with without adding meddling goody-goody Gryffindors to the mix, she only hoped that they'd let what they'd seen go, she did not need anyone else interfering in her life. She had enough people telling her what to do as it was.

However Sirius wasn't the only thing on her mind at the moment. There was definitely something going on with Marius and his friends' gang. It couldn't be anything good.

For one thing she'd noticed an unfamiliar owl delivering mail to her brother almost daily. It didn't belong to anyone in her family, that was for sure, but she did recognise it…who exactly did it belong to? She knew that she'd seen it before…over Christmas maybe, and…delivering post to Regulus once or twice that was it! So the owl had to belong to someone in the Black family, why was it that that thought was not particularly comforting…

They were planning something clearly, and something big at that. What were they up to? They weren't seriously getting involved with Voldemort? They couldn't be that stupid surely? But deep down she knew; they were, what else could they be doing? And Marius had certainly said things often enough to make this a valid explanation. But…she just couldn't believe that her family, despite being what they were, could actually do something so dangerous, so wrong, so… monumentally stupid… Despite everything they had done they were still her blood. But she was worried, and had every intention of keeping an eye on them. However she should probably warn Sirius of her suspicions, she knew that he had his own problems at the moment, but he still needed to know. How could he prepare himself if he didn't know what was coming?

XXX

The next day Crystal decided to do exactly that, warn Sirius about what was happening.

She waited until after breakfast, begging off Sienna by saying that she had left a book in the dorm and would catch up with her in Charms before setting off for the other side of the Hall to talk to Sirius at the Gryffindor table.

She knew of course that this course of action was risky but it had to be done. She reasoned that clandestine meetings were all well and good but in the end confidence was the key. If you did something in plain sight, acted as though nothing was out of the ordinary and you had every right to be doing exactly what you were then no one would spare you a second glance or question your right to be there. It was a long shoot but it could work as long as she didn't act suspiciously, and there were at least enough after breakfast crowds that she wouldn't be immediately noticeable.

There was no point dwelling on what might happen, she'd jinx herself before she even started! Besides, Sirius needed to be aware of what was going on and at present he was unfortunately oblivious to the plotting of the Slytherins.

She wasn't keen about getting the Marauders or the other 6th year Gryffindors involved but nine heads were better than one and if they knew something was up they'd all be on the look out for clues…her very own army of spies…now that was an idea with merit!

She tried to keep the grin off her face as she approached the clearly hostile group of Gryffindors. It wouldn't help her case if they saw her grinning for no reason, James Potter was already glaring accusingly at her, as though it were her fault his best friend would not confide in him.

"Hey." She greeted Sirius quietly, nervously adjusting her book bag as she accidentally caught his surprised eyes. Why was she this nervous again? She was only supposed to be warning him about Marius and co, not professing her undying love or anything, nothing so tawdry.

"This is ridiculous!" She fumed internally, "For Merlin's sake he's just a guy! Pull yourself together Maycomb now is not the time to get distracted!" Fortunately her internal scolding had the mental effect of being doused with a bucket of ice water and she was able to pull herself together somewhat, at least enough to organise her thoughts into some kind of coherent monologue.

"Hey." Greeted Sirius with a self-conscious nod of his head and a slightly confused smile, brushing his silky hair out of his eyes with a slightly trembling hand, "I thought you weren't talking to me." He stated mildly, though there was an undertone of accusation to his would be calm voice.

"Great, just great," mused Crystal frustratedly, "he's pissed off with me which means he's probably not going to be open to what I have to say."

"I didn't want to cause a scene." She replied honestly, dropping her bag to the floor and moving to sit opposite him, next to the obviously curious Lily Evans in the only available seat at their end of the House table.

"Little late for that don't you think?" Sniped James viciously, not that she really blamed him for it. He was little more than a child and he did not understand what was going on here, it was understandable that he would be angry and want to strike out at the nearest available target, namely her.

Shooting his friend a dirty look Sirius asked what they were all thinking, "So what brings you over to our corner of the Hall then?"

"To offer a warning." She responded cautiously, she wasn't quite sure how Sirius was going to react to this, his temper was mercurial at the best of times and he tended to act rashly without considering the consequences of his actions. Still, he did have to know what was going on.

"About what?" Questioned Lily curiously, she seemed to be the only one not too shocked by Crystal's sudden appearance to be able to string together coherent sentences.

" Just like last time." Mused Crystal with interest, apparently the girl was made of sterner stuff than it appeared at first glance.

Crystal had noted with interest the fact that she appeared to be spending more and more time with the Marauders lately, perhaps James Potter's advances weren't quite as unwelcome to her as she had led people to believe…. This could only strengthen her cause. With Lily there to prod them in the right direction the Marauders would be encouraged to think more analytically and act more carefully.

Crystal had had little contact with the Muggleborn girl herself; being in a different House and year to her, but she did know her by reputation. By all accounts Lily was fair, open minded, and not as prone to House prejudice as most Gryfffindors, she was also reported to be quite intelligent, often ranked higher than Marius and Violet in end of year exams, (to Marius' intense fury) in short Crystal respected her even if she didn't particularly like her.

"I don't know exactly…" Returned Crystal, measuring her words carefully, unsure exactly how much to tell them.

"Well that's helpful." Interrupted James snappishly, still glaring at Crystal in obvious distrust.

She did not give him the satisfaction of replying to his barb, merely looked at him, raising an eyebrow in silent contemplation of him, until his glare subsided, replaced by a look of confusion, he clearly did not understand her. She did not have time for his games.

This time Remus was the one to shoot James an irritated look, "Let her speak." He pleaded in a soft slightly roughened voice.

James appeared chastened by his friend's request and remained silent thereafter.

"A very interesting group dynamic indeed." Noted Crystal with equal parts curiosity and concern, she wasn't entirely sure what she had just got herself involved in but she had a feeling that it might be dangerous, things involving the Marauders usually were.

She was still unsure quite what to make of Remus, but he appeared to be on her side so for now she would give him the benefit of the doubt, even if the boy was clearly hiding something she reasoned that everybody had secrets.

Tilting her head towards Remus in silent thanks Crystal continued her explanation as best she could, "There's something weird going on with Marius and his friends…"

Upon seeing Sirius open his mouth as if to interrupt her she raised a hand in the universal signal of silence and his tongue stilled. Relieved she continued quickly, almost tripping over her words in her hurry to get them out before she was discovered at this table by someone unfortunate. Unbeknownst to her she already had been, Severus Snape had seen the entire encounter…

"Marius has been getting a lot of mail from this black eagle owl." She explained, shooting covert furtive glances around in a vain attempt to check for eavesdroppers before continuing, "I don't recognise the bird which means it doesn't belong to anyone in my family and he is looking far too smug for comfort about whatever is in those letters. I'm not getting a good feeling about this whole situation. He is up to something I can feel it. I just thought they you ought to know…" She trailed off, uncertain what to do or say next, she had only thought as far ahead as how to approach the Marauders, not how to end this conversation or what to do about Marius. She only hoped Sirius had some kind of logical plan about what to do next… Though that didn't seem likely, still, stranger things had happened…

XXX

Sirius for his part was pensive, he'd been surprised to see Crystal approach him, especially after ignoring him for so long but the circumstances under which she had done it were definitely not good.

"A black eagle owl?" He questioned, trying to keep the undercurrent of panic from overwhelming his voice. He felt like fainting. He knew very well that was what she'd said, he only hoped he had been mistaken in what he thought he'd heard.

Crystal nodded curtly in confirmation shattering any hopes he'd had about mistaken identity. He could practically feel his body breaking out in a cold sweat. This was not good.

"A black eagle owl…" He mused, considering the words carefully as if seeking to divine some hidden meaning from them, something other than what they so clearly indicated to him. That sounded suspiciously like his cousin Bellatrix's owl, not that she ever sent him mail but he'd certainly seen the bird often enough at home.

Bellatix. Shit that was not good! She was a depraved bitch at the best of times and he strongly suspected that she and her husband were already servants of this new Dark Lord. If she was corresponding with Marius and his little friends that could only mean one thing, either they were already servants of the Dark Lord or they very soon would be.

"Shit Reg what have you done?" Cursed Sirius internally. If Marius and his gang were involved then Regulus would surely be involved too, the little twerp always had been a sheep, he'd follow whoever he thought was big and bad enough to protect him, whoever he felt he could look up to. Time was that had been Sirius but since Sirius' start at Hogwarts and his sorting into Gryffindor that honour had been transferred to Marius. There was not doubt in Sirius' mind that Regulus would do whatever Marius asked of him and Marius could sure as hell be a twisted son of a bitch, as his treatment of his own sister conclusively proved.

Marius and Bellatrix together was a marriage made in hell. How could he have not noticed this happening? Cursing himself for his inattention (he could not afford to be so sloppy in such dangerous times!) Sirius determined to tell Crystal what he knew. She needed to be prepared, besides, he was only returning the favour, she had warned him first. Without her interference he'd still be dangerously ignorant. In such situations ignorance was not bliss.

Noting his preoccupation Crystal stated what they all now knew, " I take it you know that owl then?" She asked inquisitively, blue eyes alight with interest. He wondered if perhaps she'd guessed that he would recognise it, she didn't seem all that surprised by his reaction.

"I know it." He agreed redundantly, "If it's the one I'm thinking of it belongs to my cousin Bellatrix."

Crystal closed her eyes dejectedly; a curse word clearly visible on her lips before she swallowed it and stated simply, "It's worse than I thought."

"Apparently." Agreed Sirius tiredly. He really didn't see how this could get much worse.

" I don't understand." Stated Lily in irritation at the conversation quite obviously taking place above all of their heads.

" Lets just say that Bellatrix is not someone that any of them should be involved with." Retorted Sirius sardonically.

"So she's a bad influence… what?" Asked Lily insistently.

"She's like a dog with a bone!" Thought Sirius, highly amused by her persistence.

"She has questionable allegiances." Explained Crystal vaguely.

Sirius shot her a grateful look, the Marauders knew all about his family's dark links but Lily didn't and for some reason he didn't want her to think badly of him.

"Anything else we should know about?" Asked Sirius, not sure he really wanted to hear the answer to this question.

"I don't have any proof but I think they've been having some kind of meetings with other Slytherins in the library…about what I couldn't say." To Sirius her obvious pause in the middle of the sentence seemed to indicate otherwise but he did not contradict her, he'd have to try and talk to her again later, when there weren't so many witnesses.

"So why not report them to a teacher?" Suggested Lily tentatively, not that that was surprising considering Sirius' reaction the last time she had suggested involving a teacher.

"And say what?" Questioned Sirius reasonably.

"What you just told us?" muttered James, sardonically raising an eyebrow.

"What that we think they're planning something nefarious and evil?" Mocked Crystal irritably.

Sirius inwardly cringed, James did not take kindly to being mocked, of course Crystal didn't know that…

Continuing on oblivious she returned to explaining the situation to James, "We don't have any proof. It's not illegal to get mail and they'll claim that the meetings in the library are a study group or something. We have nothing except suspicions." She shook her head sadly and in tone that implied long experience with such situations, said simply, "No one is going to believe us."

"So why bother telling us any of this if we're not actually going to do anything about it?" Snapped James angrily.

"So that you're aware of what's going on and won't be surprised if they try anything." She responded haughtily, gazing at James in distaste.

Quite obviously she did not know what to make of him and was concerned he might prove to be more of a hindrance than a help. He appeared to feel much the same. They'd barely talked twice and already there was clearly no love lost between the two of them. Just perfect!

On the upside at least Sirius now knew what this conversation had been about. She did want to warn him, he didn't think she was being entirely cynical with her motives, but she also wanted people do to her dirty work for her, to keep their eyes on the Slytherins so that they could all compare notes later, which also explained why she had chosen to tell all of them rather than just him. Sneaky, and such a plan might just prove to be beneficial to all of them in the long run.

"We'll keep an eye on things." Agreed Lily readily; surprising everyone with her quick acquiescence despite her obvious confusion about what exactly was going on.

Sirius personally was starting to see what had James so infatuated with her. He'd never understood his best friends' attraction to the red head before but now he was starting to realise that it might be more than just physical and he could certainly see why. The girl had a quick mind, she was loyal, persistent and brave, not at all like the giggly little twits she seemed to hang out with. Yes Lily Evans most definitely had his seal of approval, he would be quite happy for those two to live happily ever after and let him play the cool godfather to their dozen kids, if they ever got their act together that was…

"Of course we will." Concurred Remus, clearly speaking for all the Marauders if his stern glances at Peter and James were anything to go by.

Sirius didn't need Remus' encouragement, he inclined his head in agreement anyway, not that there had ever been any question of his helping Crystal.

"Thank you." She acknowledged with obvious gratitude to the redhead, and Remus for agreeing to help her.

"Anytime." Smiled Lily bashfully, clearly unsure what to say next. An uncomfortable silence quickly ensued.

The silence was swiftly broken by Crystal's, as was becoming habit, hasty withdrawal, something she seemed almost programmed to do having revealed, once again more than she had intended.

"I'm going to be late for Charms." She stammered, nervously moving away from the group, "Be safe Sirius." She murmured sincerely, catching his eyes in a searing look for the briefest of moments before grabbing her bag and disappearing into the teaming crowd of students hurriedly exiting the Great Hall for lessons.

She was gone before he could so much as reply.

Once again she was apparently leaving clean up duties to Sirius. That was quickly becoming an annoying habit….

XXX

Meanwhile over at the Slytherin table Severus Snape was smirking darkly. Crystal Maycomb consorting with Gryffindors, this was indeed an interesting turn of events. How could he use this situation to his advantage…?

**Yeah I'm back, and look an extra long chapter! (I know that really doesn't make up for the lateness but real life has to take precedence!)**

**I haven't forgotten this story, honest, I often think about things to add to it but I have to be in the right 'zone' for writing or else I really can't get inside the character's heads and rarely does my 'zone' actually coincide with free time. (I'm not just making up crap to use as an excuse it's true! I really want this story to turn out well so I don't want to screw it up by rushing, whether this story is actually working remains to be seen, but still I'm mainly writing this for my own amusement anyway, besides, when I finish I'll probably go back and edit and rewrite it anyway.)**

**Right anyway please review and tell me what you think, it would be nice to know if anyone is still reading!**

**Thanks for reading, now review!**

**XXX**

**PS In response to criticism about the future one shots I've added if you don't like them don't read them, they're not vital to the story and I'm not just randomly skipping ahead without finishing this story I just had inspiration to write those one shots in the same universe and none for this story at the time so I thought people might appreciate me publishing something rather than nothing. It isn't that I don't plan to finish this story its just that it takes time to get back into the right frame of mind, so sometimes its easier just to write a one shot just to keep the creative juices flowing.**

**PPS I DO NOT HATE JAMES! Re reading this chapter I realise it may come across as very anti James but he is just a little kid scared of loosing his best friend, he'll grow up eventually but for now he is acting a little bratish, no one is perfect!**


End file.
